On 21 May 2004 14:06:06 GMT, Ignoramus29346
> wrote:

>I have been baking sourdough bread in a bread machine for a year,
>about 2x per week. I used Sams' Club enriched flour ($4.50 per 25 lbs
>sack)and it worked great. Also, about a year ago, I bought a 50 lb
>sack of unbleached, not enriched flour from a baker. The flour spent a
>year in my clean and relatively dry basement.
>
>The bad news is that when I switched to this flour, the bread stopped
>rising properly. It looks like the air bubbles appear alright, but
>they come out of the dough rather than stay trapped. So the dough does
>not rise properly.
>
>Any ideas?
>
>i

Hi "i",

One quick thought:

The second batch of flour may be significantly lower in protein. The
protein (gluten) in wheat flour is what allows the gasses to become
"trapped." Bread can be made with almost any flour, but there are
byproducts of the sourdough process that degrade the gluten. If you
start with little, and degrade that, you may not be able to get the
loaves to rise properly.

Perhaps the easiest way to approach this would be to add to the flour
some of the pure protein. It is sold as "vital wheat gluten." That may
help you to use the flour as you wish.

All the best,

--
Kenneth

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