Fresh Milled Flatbread
Rustic herbed flatbread brushed with olive oil and sea salt, made from 100% freshly milled hard white wheat. One bowl, one rise, ready in 90 minutes. Great with dips, soups, or torn into salad.
Key Takeaways
- 60-minute autolyse is the single biggest tenderness upgrade.
- Dimple deep — those wells trap the olive oil and brown beautifully.
- Bake on a preheated surface for the bottom crust.
- Brush with more oil right out of the oven.
- Eat warm. Flatbreads stale fast — make what you'll eat.
About this recipe
Every fresh milled kitchen needs a weeknight flatbread. This is mine: a single-rise dough, dimpled with fingertips, drizzled with olive oil, scattered with herbs and flaky salt. It bakes flat with crispy edges and a soft interior, the perfect partner for hummus, baba ganoush, or a Sunday soup. The dough is straightforward: flour, water, yeast, olive oil. Hydration sits at 70% — enough to give an open, slightly chewy crumb without making rolling impossible. A 60-minute autolyse before adding yeast and salt softens the bran and gives you a much tenderer crust. Makes 4 personal-sized flatbreads.
Prep: 20 min
Bake: 20 min
Hydration: 70%
Ingredients
- Freshly milled hard white wheat flour500 g
- Water (warm)350 g
- Instant yeast4 g
- Olive oil (plus extra for drizzling)30 g
- Fine sea salt10 g
- Flaky salt, fresh rosemary or thyme for toppingto taste
Instructions
- 1
Whisk water and flour together in a large bowl until no dry spots remain. Rest 60 minutes for autolyse.
- 2
Sprinkle yeast over the dough, then add olive oil and salt. Mix and squeeze until incorporated.
- 3
Rest 30 minutes.
- 4
Perform 2 sets of stretch-and-folds, 30 minutes apart.
- 5
Bulk ferment until doubled, about 90 minutes total at warm room temperature.
- 6
Preheat oven to 475°F (245°C) with a baking stone or heavy sheet pan inside.
- 7
Divide dough into 4 equal pieces. Stretch each into a rough oval on parchment, about 1/2-inch thick.
- 8
Dimple the surface deeply with your fingertips. Drizzle with olive oil.
- 9
Scatter with flaky salt and fresh herbs.
- 10
Slide parchment onto the hot baking surface. Bake 12–15 minutes until edges are golden and the top is crackled.
- 11
Brush with more olive oil while hot.
- 12
Tear apart and serve warm.
fresh flour baking guide for beginners — hydration, gluten development, and grain choice tips that make this recipe work.
Learn about this grain: Hard White Wheat guide — flavor, milling notes, baking tips, and four in-depth guides on hydration, storage, and common mistakes. Or browse more Hard White Wheat recipes.
Learn a technique
All guides →- How to Autolyse Fresh Milled FlourCombine flour and water and let it rest before adding yeast and salt. Bran softens, gluten develops passively, and the final dough is dramatically easier to handle.
- Fresh Milled Flour Hydration GuideHydration is the single variable that fixes more fresh-milled bread problems than any other adjustment. Bagged bread flour is engineered to behave predictably — milled to a uniform fine particle, aged for weeks, and stripped of the thirsty bran and germ. Fresh-milled flour is the opposite: it contains every part of the kernel, and the intact bran soaks up water slowly. The same recipe that produces a slack, sticky white-flour dough produces a dry, tight fresh-milled dough unless you increase the liquid. This guide explains why hydration matters more for fresh flour, how each grain behaves, how to read dough texture by feel, how to convert standard recipes, and how to troubleshoot the most common hydration symptoms.
- How To Convert White Flour Recipes to Fresh Milled FlourMost fresh-milled disasters happen on the conversion. A baker takes a beloved white-flour recipe, swaps in fresh flour cup-for-cup, follows the original times, and pulls out a dense, dry, or gummy loaf. The recipe was not the problem — fresh-milled flour simply needs five adjustments. This guide walks through the conversion in order: choose the right grain for the recipe type, swap by weight not volume, increase hydration, add an autolyse, expect faster fermentation, and watch out for the four most common conversion errors.
- How To Build Gluten With Fresh Milled FlourGluten development in fresh-milled flour is a different craft than in commercial white flour. White-flour doughs love aggressive kneading, slap-and-folds, and stand mixers on high — the smooth endosperm forms long uninterrupted gluten strands quickly. Fresh-milled flour cannot work that way because the bran physically interrupts every gluten strand it touches. The bakers who get gorgeous open crumb out of fresh flour all do the same thing: hydrate fully, rest patiently, fold gently, and choose the right grain. This guide walks through the science and the technique.
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How to Autolyse Fresh Milled Flour
Combine flour and water and let it rest before adding yeast and salt. Bran softens, gluten develops passively, and the final dough is dramatically easier to handle.
Fresh Milled Flour Hydration Guide
Hydration is the single variable that fixes more fresh-milled bread problems than any other adjustment. Bagged bread flour is engineered to behave predictably — milled to a uniform fine particle, aged for weeks, and stripped of the thirsty bran and germ. Fresh-milled flour is the opposite: it contains every part of the kernel, and the intact bran soaks up water slowly. The same recipe that produces a slack, sticky white-flour dough produces a dry, tight fresh-milled dough unless you increase the liquid. This guide explains why hydration matters more for fresh flour, how each grain behaves, how to read dough texture by feel, how to convert standard recipes, and how to troubleshoot the most common hydration symptoms.
How To Convert White Flour Recipes to Fresh Milled Flour
Most fresh-milled disasters happen on the conversion. A baker takes a beloved white-flour recipe, swaps in fresh flour cup-for-cup, follows the original times, and pulls out a dense, dry, or gummy loaf. The recipe was not the problem — fresh-milled flour simply needs five adjustments. This guide walks through the conversion in order: choose the right grain for the recipe type, swap by weight not volume, increase hydration, add an autolyse, expect faster fermentation, and watch out for the four most common conversion errors.
How To Build Gluten With Fresh Milled Flour
Gluten development in fresh-milled flour is a different craft than in commercial white flour. White-flour doughs love aggressive kneading, slap-and-folds, and stand mixers on high — the smooth endosperm forms long uninterrupted gluten strands quickly. Fresh-milled flour cannot work that way because the bran physically interrupts every gluten strand it touches. The bakers who get gorgeous open crumb out of fresh flour all do the same thing: hydrate fully, rest patiently, fold gently, and choose the right grain. This guide walks through the science and the technique.