All Trumps Bromated = Magic Pizza Dust

[Don K]

I have been making pizza at home for a while now and have almost exclusively used KASL and KABF. I never really had any complaints about either. My pizzas are usually good, sometimes a little better, and once in a while they turn out very good. I have experimented with different hydrations, oven temps, cold ferment times, as well as different amounts of yeast, salt, sugar, and oil but I never could seem to take my crust to the next level.

So I decided to try some All Trumps high gluten bromated.

Even though the dough was cold because I opened it only 30 minutes after I took it out of the refrigerator, it was extensible and very workable. It was much easier to stretch and shape than the KA flours.

I didn't preheat the oven as long as I usually do and the oven spring was still very good.

I could get used to this stuff.

[ThatsAmore]

Looks great Klink

I see at some point, I'm going to have to move past cracker style and try some NY Style.

[TXCraig1]

Now that pie looks awesome!

[JConk007]

Way to go Colonel!
I love the AT and remeber when I first got my hands on it some years ago  like you say MAGIC!
John

[deb415611]

That looks great Klink.  I have been using KA flours also and may have to try some All Trumps.

[Pappy]

Excellent looking pie, Klink.  I too am a convert to bromate, and I give full credit to the advocacy of member Scott123 for the conversion.  He has been a tireless advocate on this site for bromated flour; reading his posts after struggling with KA flours forever really set the light bulb off over my head.  

After extensive experience using the high gluten bromated All Trumps flour, I have switched, also on Scott123's recommendation, to a medium gluten bromated flour, GM Full Strength.  I found the All Trumps a tad too chewy for my taste, and sometimes struggled with extensibility issues, as I am a strong kneader, as it were.  I've only made a couple of pies with it, but the Full Strength addresses these issues beautifully.

In my experience, bromated flours give superior oven spring, are easy to work with, allow for lower hydration levels, and brown superbly at lower oven temps.  I think it no coincidence that bromated All Trumps became the flour of choice for NY pizza makers around the same time as the introduction of the lower temperature deck oven.  It's an odd paradox that these incredibly forgiving flours, so ideally suited to the nonprofessional home baker, are not readily available (especially in smaller quantities) at the retail level.

[thezaman]

don, beautiful pie!!! what pepperoni, and sauce did you use? the difference in bromated and non is not minor. that bromate gives the dough some major oomph and crispness.scott123 knows ny pie.

[Pete-zza]

Pappy,

As you may know, the use of potassium bromates in flours is outlawed in California (without all kinds of warnings and notices) and in several countries around the world. The major pizza chains in the U.S. do not use bromated flours. However, several smaller chains, like Buddy's, Hungry Howie's, Mellow Mushroom (or so we believe) and Papa Gino's, do use bromated flours but usually don't publicly say so (Hungry Howie's does, however).

There is also a big movement afoot to get so-called "clean labels". The demand for clean labels comes from consumers who are demanding simpler and more healthy food products, and also from governmental pressure. I have been reading articles with increasing frequency recently that talk about how food and ingredients scientists are looking for ways to get rid of many of the conditioners, additives, preservatives and other chemicals used in baked goods, including potassium bromate. An example of such an article is this one: http://www.bakingbusiness.com/Features/Formulating%20and%20R%20and%20D/2011/4/Enzymes.aspx. If anything, I think we can expect the trend to clean labels to intensify, not to abate.

For those who do not have access to or cannot use 50 pound bags of bromated flours, or do not have access to places that repackage bromated flours in small quantities, PennMac, at http://www.pizzamaking.com/forum/index.php?action=post;topic=20336.0;num_replies=5, does repackage the All Trumps bleached and bromated flour in 5-pound bags. However, with shipping costs, it becomes quite expensive for the small amount of flour involved.

Peter

[Pappy]

Peter:

Thank you for that informative post.  It is good to know that bromated flour is available in smaller quantities as long as one is willing to pay the price.

I am all for clean labels, and I am all for fewer chemicals and adulterants in food.  I think the clean label movement is a good one, and all the more admirable in that it is consumer driven.  The market is responding to consumer demand, and that is almost always a good thing.

That being said, markets are ultimately about choice, and I am appalled that bromated flours are unavailable in California, and in numerous countries around the world, by government fiat.  Bromated flours have superior qualities that have not been equalled, let alone surpassed by more modern formulations.  Harvest King, a very good flour that uses ascorbate as an oxidizing agent, cannot even approach a medium strength bromated flour in ease of handling and excellence of the final product. 

One can be made aware of the health controversy surrounding bromate, and yet make an informed choice to use it.  The science is unsettled and alarmist, IMHO.  Scientific consensus, unfortunately, is not science; it is often wrong, as the now largely discredited generations long slander of saturated fat has proven. 

I eat simply, mostly whole foods, very little that is processed or refined.  I am a bit weak on the fruits and vegetables, but I eat plenty of critters that eat fruits and vegetables, so I figure I get my recommended dose one way or the other.  I likely put far fewer pollutants in my body each week eating a couple of baguettes or pizzas made with bromated flour than does a person drinking a soda a day, or eating a bowl of Cheerios each morning.  A power bar, all the rage among healthy yuppies, has more crap in it than a bromated boule. 

I don't eat at pizza chains, but I do frequent independent shops that probably use bromated flour.  I did grow up in the 70's devouring Papa Gino's, and found that their product was still pretty good when I grabbed a slice last year.  Now I know why.   

[Pappy]

Invention is the beating heart of the modern world, the soul of progress, as it were, and if enzyme based products prove a suitable, efficacious, and cost effective replacement for bromate and other dough additives, more power to the innovators.  But this article appears at bakingbusiness.com, a site for commercial operators.  What of the amateur home baker?  Right now enzymes are the purview of commercial and industrial food production, and perhaps of the serious hobbyist.  Are these enzyme based products now available at PennMac, ready to be shipped to your front door?  Will Peter Reinhart include a breathless chapter on enzymes in his next $35.00 lavishly illustrated tome?  Until then, poor Mr. or Mrs. Grundy, who just want to bake a nice loaf for the family, or a tasty pizza on a Friday night after work, are, as they say, sh*t out of luck.

Of course, bromated flour seems almost to have been created for the Mr. and Mrs. Grundy's of the world, and yet has been denied to them by government fiat, or made scarce by fear and political correctness.  Why can I not get a five pound, cheaply priced bag of bromated flour, clearly labeled, at WalMart or any grocery chain?  Alcohol and tobacco products, both clearly more problematic than bromate, are ubiquitous.  If you think about it, it doesn't make sense.

One man's meat used to be another man's poison.  Now, increasingly, one man's meat is another man's banned substance.  I don't like the change.

[Pete-zza]

Pappy,

I remember several years ago being referred to a technical person at Bay State Milling on a flour matter that their customer service person could not answer, and one of the questions I asked him is why high-gluten flour was not sold at retail in supermarkets. He told me that there was insufficient demand for it, and added that bakers, who were the major users of high-gluten flour, weren't about to go to supermarkets and load up on 5-pound bags. Later, I asked the same question of a representative of King Arthur why their Sir Lancelot high-gluten flour was not sold in supermarkets, and his answer was the same, except that he suggested that I ask my local grocer to carry such a product. However, I suspected that King Arthur was not really interested in that market especially since it was able to sell the Sir Lancelot high-gluten flour at great markup through their catagog and online.

At the moment, the only flours that are bromated are high-gluten flours and some bread flours. All-purpose flours are almost never bromated (or so I was told by Tim the Baker at General Mills). General Mills, which is the miller of the Better for Bread flour, which uses ascorbic acid in lieu of potassium bromate, sells that flour at retail (as well to professionals under the Harvest King brand). Since GM is already a seller at the supermarket retail level, I suspect that if there was a consumer market for bromated high-gluten flours and/or bromated bread flours, and if such a market were profitable, they would serve that market. This leads me to believe that there is insufficient demand at the supermarket level for bromated flours sold in small quantities.

If the day ever arrives where the food scientists come up with a good substitute for potassium bromate, then the millers might be able to add it to their flours. They already add barley malt or fungal amylase and vitamins to most of their flours, and ascorbic acid to some of their flours, so I would think that adding a bromate substitute would not be a problem, just as some millers add azodicarbonamide (another popular bromate substitute) to their flours (commonly done with flours outside of the U.S.)

Peter

[Don K]

I was wondering how long it was going to take before the bromate health concerns were going to be brought up. My question is, why haven't there been any studies done where they do chemical analysis of actual baked goods to determine how much KBrO₃ is actually still present after baking? AFAIK, there haven't been any such published studies. Everything is based on experiments on rats. Didn't we learn from the saccharin scare how reliable rats are as a test subject?

don, beautiful pie!!! what pepperoni, and sauce did you use? the difference in bromated and non is not minor. that bromate gives the dough some major oomph and crispness.scott123 knows ny pie.

Thanks Larry. The pepperoni is 38mm Ezzo. As for sauce...contrary to popular consensus here, I prefer a rich cooked sauce on my NY pies. I used to always make my own, but I have been too lazy to do so lately. This pie is made with DelGrosso NY Style jar sauce. This stuff is pretty good for a jar sauce and it is readily available for real cheap. I usually keep some on hand for when I don't have the time or motivation to make my own. I sometimes use just spiced up 6-in-1 tomatoes if I'm in the mood, but usually not.

[Pete-zza]

Invention is the beating heart of the modern world, the soul of progress, as it were, and if enzyme based products prove a suitable, efficacious, and cost effective replacement for bromate and other dough additives, more power to the innovators.  But this article appears at bakingbusiness.com, a site for commercial operators.  What of the amateur home baker?  Right now enzymes are the purview of commercial and industrial food production, and perhaps of the serious hobbyist.  Are these enzyme based products now available at PennMac, ready to be shipped to your front door?  Will Peter Reinhart include a breathless chapter on enzymes in his next $35.00 lavishly illustrated tome?

Pappy,

If Tom Lehmann is correct about his analysis of the Domino's dough, at http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?p=72903#p72903, then it looks like Domino's is already using an oxidative maltogenic enzyme as a substitute for potassium bromate.

Peter

[chickenparm]

I also agree,excellent stuff! I ordered 2 Bags(5lbs each) of AT flour,one bromated,the other not.They made some of the best pies I ever eaten.I plan to order a 50 lb bag eventually.Im using Bouncer and sometimes KABF,but I really love the AT.

 

[Tscarborough]

I also like the AT bromated.  It is only 17 bucks for 50# at RD, so get a couple of buddies and split a bag.  I am ready for another if anyone in Austin area wants to split a bag (I can freeze only about 20#s at a time).

[Pappy]

Peter:

I agree that bromated flour is not available at the retail level because there is no demand for it.  But why is that?  Obviously, there is no demand for bromated flour because the average home baker knows nothing about it, and because those in a position to inform the public of its virtues and its deficiencies in an informed and authoritative manner are not doing so.

I only found out about bromated flour because I discovered this board, and liked one of Scott123's posts enough to patiently read through his entire post history.  His informed, assertive, and tireless advocacy of bromated flour, often in the face of strong resistance by other members, gave me the information I needed to try out the product for myself and make an informed choice.

After years of frustration with KA flour, to the point where I was ready to give up baking, I lucked out.  I'm even luckier, as I am in the restaurant business and can purchase GM bromated flour products through PFG.  How many thousands of amateur home bakers have not been so lucky, who have given up, or settled for inferior results, or who have had to make needless extra effort with irrelevant dough-making methods, when a five pound bag of bromated flour could have solved 95% of their problems?

Any author of a bread or pizza-making book worth his or her salt would know about bromated flour, the pros and the cons.  A dispassionate chapter, or even section on bromated flour in their expensive, lavishly illustrated tomes would go a long way towards building that consumer demand that creates a market.  Alton Brown, in 30 minutes, could turn the market for bromated flour around.

He, and they, won't, of course, because it's politically incorrect to do so, because many of them are on KA's payroll, and because baker-friendly, easy to use bromated flours obviate the need for all those little tricks that sell books and fill airtime.     

[Pappy]

Pappy,

If Tom Lehmann is correct about his analysis of the Domino's dough, at http://thinktank.pmq.com/viewtopic.php?p=72903#p72903, then it looks like Domino's is already using an oxidative maltogenic enzyme as a substitute for potassium bromate.

Peter

Interesting, Peter, but I'm not quite sure if that is a recommendation. 

[AimlessRyan]

My question is, why haven't there been any studies done where they do chemical analysis of actual baked goods to determine how much KBrO₃ is actually still present after baking?

Money. Does anyone stand to make money by conducting such studies? Scientists aren't gonna do it just for fun or even to learn something. They'll only do it if they get paid. And the people paying them will only do it if they get paid even more.

[AimlessRyan]

He, and they, won't, of course, because it's politically incorrect to do so, because many of them are on KA's payroll, and because baker-friendly, easy to use bromated flours obviate the need for all those little tricks that sell books and fill airtime.      

...and because they know very little about pizzamaking or baking. Since they can't tell you what they don't know, they just tell you whatever they feel like telling you, while pretending to be experts.

Money.

[buceriasdon]

Here in Mexico bromated flour is banned so Azodicarbonamide is used in just about every flour brand I've used or looked at expect for cake flours, finely ground low protein flours.  I've wondered why it's not more widely used North of me.
Don