September 19, 2019 - 4:19am
Antimo Caputo “00" Chefs Flour
I would like to know the specs and characteristics of Antimo Caputo 00" Chefs Flour. The bag states that it is good for long fermentation. I read that “00” signifies the ash content and in other places that “00” describes a flour of extremely fine grain. Often described as feeling like baby powder.
I searched Goggle and found very little information about Antimo Caputo “00" Chefs Flour.
I am wondering if this flour would be good for 12-16 hours of fermentation for Poolish and also super long and warm BF for sourdough.
I am interested to learn as much ch as possible about this flour.
Danny
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I just found this. http://orlandofoods.com/product/00-chefs-flour/ Their site states 13.5% protein. But I’ve read from other sources that it is ground from soft white wheat.
As far as I know, Orlando Foods is the only importer of Caputo flours in the US. I have called them before, and plan to do so today.
Why is the thorough specifications and description of the characteristics of flour, either impossible or difficult to find?
Dan
First up, see: https://www.cooksinfo.com/italian-flours
The above is a bit contradictory, saying "grano tenero" is low gluten cake flour, but Caputo's Chef's flour is advertised as 13% protein. But the chart on that page does say 00 flour is 50% extraction, and less than .5% ash.
For how it actually bakes, see:
https://brickovenbaker.com/products/antimo-caputo-chefs-00-flour
https://brickovenbaker.com/pages/information-about-caputo-flours
00 and Chef's is mentioned several times throughout, so at least skim for it all the way through.
Brick Oven Baker sells a lot of Caputo flour in the US, both from his web site, and his Amazon store. And he answers email. But read those two pages before contacting, that might be exactly what you're looking for. His descriptions of almost the whole Caputo range of flours is very informative... at least from a pizza-maker's perspective.
Then there is the offical Caputo page:
http://www.mulinocaputo.it/en/flour/la-linea-cucina/cuoco
(Cuoco is Italian for cook or chef.) That page does not give ash content or extraction rate. But it does show
PANIFICAZIONE W 300/320
ELASTICITÀ P/L 0,50 / 0,60
...
I only used 00 Chef's flour as a small percentage of white flour in mostly whole grain flatbreads and loaves. I can say it is powdery, more so than common U.S. AP and bread flour, and it absorbs moisture quickly. I would keep a very wet whole grain dough, enough for 2 or 3 bakes, in the fridge, and then add in white flour to lower the hydration and then start the final rise.
What makes this flour “good for long fermentation? It states that on the bag. I read that it comes fro m soft white wheat. I also read the protein is 13%. And the bag claims, “good for long fermentation”.
I went to the Caputo site in Italy but didn’t fing why it is said to be good for long fermentation. I called Orlando Foods (only US importer of Caputo), and didn’t get my answer.
It is a mystery so far.
Dan
It's an all-purpose flour, weakish, with very low water absorption - think 55% hydration. Nothing special about really.
At W300/320 this is a medium-strong flour, not weak.
The gluten is strong, high quality and balanced (P/L, .5/.6) as typical white Italian flours are.
Whatever, I am just telling what my experience was.
Except for where specified, Caputo flour has no malted barley/wheat flour, and no vitamins or dough enhancers added. ( 00 Americana and 00 Pizza a Metro have a little malted wheat added for lower temp ovens, in order to get more sugar and browning at the lower temps. According to Brick Oven Baker.)
No added malt means no added enzymes (in a branless/germless flour), hence less sugar creation, equals longer ferment needed.
It's why Tony Gemignani recommends adding diastatic malt powder to 00 Pizzeria flour (which is maltless) when baking in home ovens. He came up with that procedure before 00 Americana was developed.
Or... "good for long fermentation" could just be more "sales puffery" than an actual technical detail.
I'm betting on the "absence of malted flour" angle.
"Use WHEAT and WHEAT ONLY with no extra additives" is featured/highlighted at:
http://orlandofoods.com/mulino-caputo-naples-renowned-all-over-the-world/
Dave, “No added malt means no added enzymes (in a branless/germless flour), hence less sugar creation, equals longer ferment needed.”
I am running a test of the flour now. I hydrated 100g with plans to autolyse it on the counter (~73F) until it completely degrades the gluten. It has been 15 hr thus far and the gluten is intact and the dough has become extensible.
The flour behaves very badly when first hydrated. It is tough, resistant to stretch, and blotchy (not smooth or incorporated). BUT after a few hours things start to radically change. If I am to cherish this flour, I have a lot to learn about using it. It is very unlike other flours that I have experienced.
Ultimately, I hope to use it for very long and warm bulk fermentation. 16-17.5 (or more) hours of fermentation @ 77-79F (or more). After baking hundreds of loaves with this BF goal I know exactly what to expect. The writing on the bag, “good for long fermentation” caused me to give it a try.
I appreciate Michael’s and your help.
Danny
NOTE - I have the spec sheet from Caputo for this flour. It is a pdf and I can’t figure a way to post it here. I you or any one else would like to take a look, send me a PM with your email address. Warning, the sheet is very technical. I can’t mkae much sense of it.
.
Dan, I wanted to show a pdf in a post a while ago. What you can do is upload the pdf to a hosting site and link to it in your post.
There are many such sites, but I found https://www.docdroid.net/ to be one of the easiest to use and least intrusive.
Lance
@mwilson, thanks for interpreting the W and P/L specs. Those were a mystery to me.
@Dan, I think the W and P/L numbers are given for all the Caputo flours, www.mulinocaputo.it/en/flour/
If you order from Orlando, please let me know how their prices compare to www.brickovenbaker.com. I didn't see prices on Orlando's web site.
@all, here's a web page that explains the W and P/L numbers. www.theartisan.net/flour_criteria_judging.htm
So it's the high W number that lets them say "for long fermentation."
That is actually a subset of a larger page about flour criteria, explaining the ash content, extraction rates, and various criteria for American, French, and Italian flours; worth bookmarking:
http://www.theartisan.net/Flours_One.htm
Dave, I ordered from Amazon, I don’t think Orlando Foods sells direct.
I am reading the paper explaining the W and P/L numbers, but I’m burning brain cells in the process. Can you simplify this for myself and others?
I did get a technical spreadsheet from Orlando Foods, but the information was too technical for me to read. The file came as a pdf. If anyone PMs me with their email address I’ll send it to them.
The test autolyse has run for about 4 hours soo far. The dough balls up like a tennis ball and it very strong and unyielding. One of my favorite breads (SFSD) uses a 16-17.5 hr bulk ferment @ 77-79F. It is brutal on the flour and pushes the dough right up to the point of degradation and often goes over. I think I’ll give this flour a try and see how it fares. I have 100’s of these loaves under my belt, so experience should be beneficial in evaluating. It will definitely tell me if it is exceptional for long and warm fermentation.
Danny
Dave, have you seen this link posted by Michael some time back? In it he discusses the W & P/L.
http://www.thefreshloaf.com/node/45241/gluten-w-pl-and-problem-durum
No, I hadn't seen it, so thanks for the link. It looks like good info. It comports with what I have read about durum elsewhere. And it corresponds to my experience with some store-bought durum flour and home-milled Kamut (which is "durum-like"). mwilson now goes on my list of who I pay extra attention to.
As far as that page at theartisan.net, with the graphs and explanations of W and P/L, I'm still trying to disgest what the test does too. I just discovered W and P/L due to this thread, (well, I've "seen" it before, but it was a mystery, until I discovered the explanation at theartisan.net.) so I'll let mwilson take first crack at it. He's obviously much more knowledgeable than I am.
ETA: Someone posted this above, but I missed it... well, here is my 2 cents...
http://www.mulinocaputo.it/en/flour/la-linea-cucina/cuoco
Cuoco translates to cook, or "chef" in this case. There is a lot of misinformation about this flour out there. I know it says 'soft wheat flour", but I am not convinced that this isn't just a way of describing the feel of 00 flour, rather than distinguishing between hard and soft wheat. It is high gluten, so I doubt it is 100% soft wheat. It could be white wheat though. I will tell you that this flour absorbs water a lot more than other flours, so you might need more water than you are used to for the same results.
"Flour with strong, elastic gluten, ideal for dough that requires a long fermentation"
"Elastic gluten and soft starch help doughs to get a great hydration. Light, with a perfect rising, satisfy the best maestri pizzaioli's needs. Ideal for long fermentation and neapolitan classic pizza"
I sent Michael the spec sheet and asked him to explain in simple terms. He did.
- ”% protein is under nutritional info: 13.5% +/- .5
- the ratio of proteins (I asked him about Gluten and Gliadin) would be not feasible to determine but that is why rheological tests like the Alveograph are used.
- The P/L value at 0.5-0.6 means it perfectly balanced. Italian millers always shoot for this. At 0.4 and below the flour is weak and extensible, spelt flour would show this low figure. 0.7 and above would represent flour that is very tenacious and lacks extensiblity as hard wheats are typically. Semola rimacinata often has P/L values of 2. which is very high indeed. Grain as well as how it is milled will determine the final properties.
Quite simply the stronger the flour the more it can handle. Such is the case it has better mixing tolerance and better fermentation tolerance. But in addition since this flour is very refined (00) and it has low amylase activity, enzymatic degradation and fermentation speed is restrained. I would expect good tolerance to both long fermentation and retardation. It doesn't specifically say what types of wheat it is produced from but it is 100% triticum. aesvitum (common wheat)” I asked Michael about the “00” designation. His reply below.”Indeed type 00 has nothing to do with the physical fineness of the meal (flour) and Italian type 00,0,1,2 are defined under law by their maximum ash content. Ash is a measure of refinement, it indicates how white the flour is. White being pure endosperm. Ash content measures minerals. Wholemeal flour contains all the minerals but white flour is mostly starch which is vaporised during the ash test leaving only the minerals. The lower the ash content the more refined (more endosperm) makes the flour.” Thanks Michael Wilson! You have taught me technical things over the years... NOTE - Michaels’s relies were posted with his permission. DannyI have been reading more on this... you peaked my curiosity. It is strange that the product uses grano tenero which is soft wheat (and they pride themselves on being part of the first soft wheat chain in Italy). I know nothing about varieties, but the 6 in this chain are Caronte, Annibale, Montecarlo, Ambrogio, Caruso and Don Carmine. But somehow the protein is higher. The 00 is going to be about 50% extraction (or sifted more for lower ash as stated above), which I was mistakenly calling a finer grind. I am sure it is a blend (as all of them are), but the fact that this soft wheat is so high in protein is strange to me. It seems that most European flour is soft wheat (in comparison to most in the USA being hard wheat), but the protein content is normally lower in those. After all, the main reason I understand Italy to used a biga was to reinforce the dough because of the weak flour.
Granted, 00 means a certain ash content spec, and hence a certain low extraction rate. However, unless specificied otherwise, Caputo's 00 flours are generally ground to a smaller particle size than American AP and bread flour.
As mwilson says, small particle size plays a part, along with the other tech specs, in how the baker/pizzaiolo/machine can "work" the dough.
From my one bag of 00 Chef's flour, I made a test biscuit, and as soon as the dough formed, I knew it was definitely not the same as American AP or bread flour. As soon as you scoop up the raw flour, you can see it has a smaller particle size.
http://www.mulinocaputo.it/en/flour/ has 20 different flours on it, not all 00. Dang, they take their flour and baked goods seriously!
(I'd love to try several of them, but I don't want to drop $75-$85 each on 55 pound (25 kg) bags, when you include shipping. some come in 1 kg bags on Amazon, so I may try a couple of those. But then I'm too cheap minded to pay over $2.50/lb for flour.)
Anyone in Indianapolis want to split an order?
That whole W-P/L thing was invented in europe. I don't think it's even a thing among major US mills.
For a fuller story, read: http://www.theartisan.net/Flours_One.htm
It's a heck of a lot more complicated than what we see at Kroger/Albertson's/Publix/Piggly-Wiggly!
I also read the Caputo uses soft wheat which shocks me because of the high protein.
When you think about it, 00 is a designation of ash content, but the ash content is low because the flour is extremely low extraction. Most ash is within the bran. With that in mind wouldn’t the flour be very fine (powdery) because of that? So, it seems that 00 tells the baker about the low ash content only, but shouldn’t the baker expect a very fine flour because of the low extraction?
I am preparing a test that will bake either tomorrow or the next day, depending on whether it is retarded or not. It is designed to test the, “good for long fermentation” claim. The dough will be mixed @ 71.5% hydration (flour, water, salt, & levain) until all flour is absorbed and not kneaded using only Caputo Chef’s flour. It will receive only 1 stretch and fold after 5 hours from mixing. The BF will last from 16-17.5hr @ 78F. After that time (hopefully 17.5 hr) the dough will be observed for gluten degradation. If it handles this test it will be good for long fermentation.
I will post my findings.
I've used this flour for a 48 hour 62F ferment. It handled it easily @ 63% hydration. That was for pizza though, and I tried it only because I received a sample bag.
Julie, do you remember if the flour was very dry @63%? I ask because yesterday I mixed a Durum and Chef’s flour combo that was targeted for 63%, but had to up that to 65 because the flour was dry, blotchy, and super tough. The dough never did get right and the bake was a bust.
Today I mixed a 71.5% hydration dough using all Chef’s flour. It handled extremely well, was supple and all around nice.
I think this flour is super thirsty, but I’ve just started working with it recently.
Danny
Danny, compared to how I like a bread dough to feel it was dry, but not blotchy or super tough. I mixed it in the food processor and it was smooth and ready to bulk in about 1 minute.
Now, Compared to a pizza dough with my usual mix (80% T65 and 20% T45) stretching was harder so I haven't gone back to the Caputo.
I baked another loaf using Chef’s Flour. It behaved a little better (hydrated @ 71.5% but in no way was it better than the American flours I use. The flavor was not bad, but not as good as the flours I’m used to. I BF @ 78F for 17.5 hr (my normal method for SFSD). It didn’t shred, but the gluten skin was so thin and fragile that the top of the loaf was unable to hold the gas and ruptured causing much lower oven spring.
Bottom line. Not a good flour for me considering the other choices available.
Danny
Grano tenero does not mean soft wheat in the American sense of the term. It's just regular wheat, as in not durum. And Italy is not be the only country that defines it like that.
@Dan, the fine-ness is due to more than just low extraction. Caputo runs the grain through rollers something like 20 or more passes to get the fine granulation. Big commercial mills are multi-million dollar machines housed inside multi-million dollar processing plants. There are boo-coo (thought I'd throw a little cajun/french your way, i like your accent in your videos :) steps in the cleaning, sorting, and preparation of the kernals before the kernal is even cracked open. And all sorts of sifting, sorting, and multiple stream-paths, and blending paths, after the first crack. It's a big and complicated flow diagram. As Caputo has about 22 different flours, that's 22 different combinations of flow diagrams.
There's even a "tempering" process that hydrates just the bran layer so it will flake off easier in the first pass, so that it takes away as little endosperm as possible. Not saying that Caputo necessarily uses that for 00 flours, but that's a common mill procedure in general, so I'm just assuming they do it too.
(((( Wrong: It's interesting how I can get a 55 pound bag of Italian-origin Caputo flour shipped to me from Brick Oven Baker in Mass., for less than the cost of a 50 pound bag of American-made Gold Medal All Trumps flour from either Amazon or a local pizza supply distributor.))))
Nevermind. I just saw alternate sources for All Trumps, and it can be had for much cheaper than Caputo. My apologies.
"So, it seems that 00 tells the baker about the low ash content only, but shouldn’t the baker expect a very fine flour because of the low extraction?"
Yes. The thing to keep in mind is that the very fine flour is from finer sifting, not from more intense grinding. That is where people get confused. It is not ground into a fine powder, but rather the larger particles after the grind are removed. Extraction is calculated by taking the weight of the flour after sifting divided by the weight before sifting. So a 50% extraction would weigh 50% less after sifting/extracting. So if the original weight was 100g, then 50g of the larger parts have been removed. If it was just ground finer, then the weight wouldn't change and the extraction would be higher. What is left is mostly the endosperm as the other parts are usually larger after milling.
Precise and well said, Maverick.
My latest test with Chef’s 00 flour produced a gluten network that was thinner that anything I can remember seeing. The test was to determine the flour’s ability to tolerate a BF @ 78F for 17.5 hr. It passed without degrading the gluten, but the skin was super thin and obviously fragile. The thin skin was unable to contain the gas during baking and consequently the oven spring lacked.
Is it possible that the very fine texture of the flour Bulk fermented as described above produced an extremely super fine gluten network (skin)? It was much finer than anything example I can think of for a description. Prior to this test, I never considered the possibility that a flour could be too fine.
Danny
I am unable to reconcile the claim that soft white wheat can produce 13.5% protein. I read that soft wheat = lower protein and hard wheat = higher.
Since 00 flour is highly sifted (50% extraction) it should contain mostly (maybe all) endosperm which contributes the vast majority of protein.
Is this the reason Soft White Wheat is able to produce 13.5% protein?
Dan
Dan, I think someone mentioned above, when Italians or other Europeans say "soft" in regards to wheat, they mean "not durum". American "hard wheat" is still "soft" to them, because it is not durum. I would suppose they call our soft wheat something else, perhaps "pastry wheat."
Thanks Dave, can you point me to a source for that? I’d like to do some research.
Also, I’ve read that French and Italian flour specs are very different from American. Something like 11.7 protein American = 13.4 French.
I am also very interested to learn about water absorption as it relates to flour spec sheets.
If memory serves (ha!), European flour analyses are based on 0% moisture content whereas American flour analyses are based on 14% moisture content. That can lead to an apparent skew in the numbers if not taken into account.
Paul
Yes, Paul. I also read about the moisture variables. The chemistry of flour is not for the simple minded. I’m not super intelligent, but remain very inquisitive.
It seems to me when you really start refining your breads, flour being the most prominent ingredient will have a profound affect on the bread produced. Not only flavor, but chew, texture, crumb, but any and all other aspects.
My present endeavor (researching this now) is to consistently produce a lacy honeycomb crumb (HoneyCombLace) that mimics croissants. After scouring the internet for many hours, it appears this is not going to be a simple or easy task. I am convinced that this type of crumb is the “Instagram” crumb of the future. It only makes sense that a crumb that is as uniform and openly spaced as a honeycomb, coupled with super thin cells walls (lacy) would appeal to the multitudes of artisan bakers. Unlike the present extreme open crumb craze, this bread will hold condiments.
This quest seems almost impossible. But a very few bakers have on occasion come close.
The crumb below was produced by Kristen of FullProofBaking. She will be our featured baker for the next Community Bake, scheduled for the end of October. For those that know her, I already bought some Cuddlefish (squid) ink and Butterfly Pea tea buds. The main bread will be her Basic SD Open Crumb.
If anyone knows a baker that is producing a similar crumb, please reply with a link.
Danny
I'm very doubtful about this. Logically it doesn't stack.
Because protein content is provided as nutritional information per weight of product and no bag of flour has 0% moisture!
Maverick gave a good link. Here's another one about what europeans mean by "grano tenero"
www.iitaly.org/node/38570
so, dittos to his "triticum aestivum" versus "triticum turgidum durum" dichotomy of soft vs hard.
here, both our soft and hard american wheat are (generally) merely varieties of triticum aestivum. Europeans are just saying that anything not "turgidum" (latin for hard) is soft.
--
As you and pmccool say, the ash % and protein % are different for Europe versus America analyses, because we include 14% water in the denominator and they don't, thereby their figures are higher for the same thing, that is also explained here, with charts: http://www.theartisan.net/Flours_One.htm almost halfway down. It says "France", not Italy, but I think the EU standard would include both.
Lots of good questions and issues raised on this thread.
I was thinking that based on some reading, but when I looked at it again I thought I was wrong. But further research has shown that what you said is indeed true. It would seem that grano tenero is common wheat (triticum aestivum) and grano duro is durum wheat (triticum durum).
Here is one of the sites that show this along with some other info:
https://gustiblog.gustiamo.com/grano-duro-and-grano-tenero-whats-the-difference/
Interestingly enough, the Indigenous wheat, White Sonora, that I’m milking right now, is 13% and is a soft wheat.
I wouldn't assume that because Caputo flours are milled in Italy that they contain exclusively Italian wheat.
I would expect that there is a proportion of American or Canadian high protein wheat in there - Manitoba, as the Italians call it (even though it may not necessarily come from Manitoba).
Lance
@albacore, (assuming you're commenting to me). Yes, you're right. Sorry I was not more specific/precise. But it is still _milled_ in Italy.
Nevermind. I just found alternate sources for All Trumps, and it can be had for much cheaper than Caputo. My apologies.
(((( Wrong: Meaning it would be shipped from Italy to Brick Oven Baker (in CT, not MA, like I thought), reshipped to me in Indy, for $10 less in total price, and 5 pounds more in quantity, than North American grown and milled Gold Medal All Trumps, which does not have to be shipped across the Atlantic. This comparison hints or suggests that Gold Medal All Trumps may be over-priced, or that Caputo is a better bang for the buck.
There is a local distributor of Gold Medal All Trumps, but buying it from them, their price not counting delivery, is higher than the Amazon price to have it shipped to my door.)
(My understanding, please correct if I'm wrong, is that many chain pizza joints "tend" to use All Trumps, and artisan pizza joints "tend" to use Caputo.)
And whatever portion of Caputo flours consist of North American wheat, that portion is making TWO trips across the Atlantic! Making it even a bigger deal! So, bottom line... I'm impressed with Caputo.))))