If you don't want to be picky about flour you don't have to be. I haven't met a wheat flour yet that hasn't found a place in the no knead recipe world. And I've even had success with a few non-wheat floues.
Brand name
Over the course of my exploration with the no knead recipe I have used over a half dozen brands of flour. They all have a place.
The most prestigious generally-available brand in my area is King Arthur, followed by
In my area there are several store brands that save a few pennies. White Rose works well. Trader Joe is also available in a lot of places outside my home territory. It's a little more expensive than other store brands, but what the heck, it's very good.
I've tried bargain-priced flours also. No Name and Brand X. If your circumstances limit your choices don't let the modesty of the flour deter you. The no knead recipe is very forgiving, as I wrote before. A home made loaf of no knead bread made from bargain flour is still tastier than the average store bought loaf of bread. Plus there are a lot of tricks that add even more flavor, so don't avoid bargain flour if that's what falls into your shopping basket.
All Purpose or Bread
Surely there's a difference between all purpose flour and bread flour. I guess I could easily go to a search engine and find out what experts say is the difference. But I'm guided by my empirical experience, such as it is. I've used both. In my experience I can't tell the difference. So I stick with what's easily available in the stores in which I shop, which is all purpose flour. Either used alone or in combination with other kinds of flour, all purpose flour passes my tests.
Rye Bread
Rye flour is available but a little too rich for my pocketbook. I make a reasonable facsimile of New York rye bread using combinations of all purpose flour and a Chappati flour. Chapatti is Asian Indian flat bread. Since I visit Patel Brothers supermarket in Queens, NY at least once a month, getting Chappati flour is not a problem for me. If Chapatti flour is not available, Atta flour is fine.
I have made good rye bread using either one ot two cups of Chapatti or Atta flour plus two or three cups of all purpose flour. The total number of cups of flour in each loaf I amke is four, so if you use three of one, use one of the other, or two and two.
Here are some extras you might want to try: Add a tablespoon or so of sunflower seeds to the four cups of flour. Add some caraway seeds to the original dough mixture, and a few more caraway seeds on top of the loaf just before baking and voila, there's a nice rye bread loaf out of your own oven.
Semolina
Semolina is the major ingredient of most Italian pasta. The only use I have these days for my old bread machine is to make pasta using semolina. Semolina is also nice to add when making no knead pizza crust. To make a pizza three quarters of the flour is whole wheat and one quarter of the flour is semolina.
Non-wheat Flour
Because my Cosmic Partner is vegetarian we are always conscious of protein in our diet. We sometimes use a small amount of soybean flour, which is a protein champion. If too much soybean flour is added the bread doesn't rise to the height I like.
You are welcome to contribute your flour comments too.Hecker. They are very good benchmarks. If you like to go for the high end, they live up to their reputations.
Gold Medal and Pillsbury are robust middle-priced brands. Of the two, I prefer Gold Medal. But I wouldn't turn away Pillsbury.
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