If you’ve been around Live Simply for any length of time, you’ve probably noticed that when it comes to baking, I lean towards using one particular flour: einkorn. I’m often asked, “What is einkorn flour? Is einkorn gluten-free? Can you sub einkorn for white flour?” This post is the ultimate guide to einkorn flour with the best recipes.
I’ll share everything you need to know to use this delicious, healthier, ancient grain in the kitchen with success.
What is Einkorn?
Einkorn is a variety of wheat. It’s known as the oldest variety of wheat, or the first wheat, making it an ancient grain. This particular species of grass grew wild for thousands of years before it was intentionally planted and harvested.
The wheat that’s commonly used today isn’t the same as the wheat our ancestors consumed for thousands of years. Regular wheat has been hybridized. Hybridization is the act of crossing two different species of plants with the goal of creating a new variety of plant. This changes the very makeup and structure of the new plant.
Why do this?
There are many reasons, from improving the yield of the crop to making a plant more disease resistant. As Carla Bartolucci explains, in Einkorn: Recipes for Nature’s Original Wheat, “During the Green Revolution from the 1940s to the 1960s, breeders created new high-yielding varieties of wheat with hybrid seeds that would carry better traits for large-scale farming.”
Einkorn and other ancient grains (like emmer and spelt) have a thick husk around the very grain.
Modern wheat has a thinner husk that’s easier to remove. Modern wheat may seem like a better choice for production and profitability. But with the increased use of pesticides and fertilizers, is this thinner husk such a good idea? Plus, that thick husk naturally occurs on grains for a reason. Why mess with what nature intended as protection?
While cross-breeding may be a good idea from a large-scale farming standpoint, how does this effect our ability to digest the grains? And what kind of effect does consuming large amounts of this grain have on our overall health?
This is where einkorn really shines, because it still holds to its original properties and nutritional values.
In our effort to make modern wheat “better” and more efficient from a production standpoint, nutrients have been lost.
Einkorn has a much higher protein content (30% more than modern wheat) and less starch (15% less than modern wheat), along with a higher concentration of minerals and flavor. This makes einkorn distinctly different than modern wheat.
And when we look at the enriched white flour that is widely used today and milled from modern wheat, the nutrients are even further removed, which is why key nutrients (now in isolated forms) must be added back in.
Einkorn is also the only wheat that’s missing certain types of gluten proteins that some people are sensitive to. Einkorn doesn’t have less gluten than modern wheat. It actually has a similar gluten content to modern wheat. The difference is the gluten structure (in einkorn) is weak, making it remarkably different than our modern wheat. (This is a super fascinating video to watch for a visual.)
Is Einkorn Gluten-Free?
Einkorn is NOT a gluten-free grain. This means einkorn is not safe if you have celiac disease (an autoimmune condition). According to celiac.org, about 1 in 100 people have celiac disease. It’s worth repeating, if you have celiac disease einkorn is NOT an option.
Some folks don’t have celiac disease, but experience a sensitivity to gluten. And some folks don’t experience any issues after consuming gluten, but are now questioning the intake of gluten.
In these scenarios, I think it’s important for us to consider a question originally asked by Robyn O’Brien…“Are we allergic to food, or are we increasingly allergic to what has been done to it?”
When it comes to the subject of gluten, we need to take a step back and ask more in depth questions about how we consume gluten.
We need to look at the fact that our entire diet now revolves around heavily processed and manipulated grains, the type of grain we consume and how that grain is prepared, the lack of variety and seasonality in our modern diet, the fact that we no longer consume fermented foods as our ancestors once did (listen to this podcast for information about this subject), and mega amounts of stress which wreak havoc on the body and gut.
Gluten isn’t the issue, for most people!
There are a lot of factors to look at when it comes to the gluten issue, but just declaring all gluten as “evil” isn’t the answer (in my opinion).
Personally, I’ve found that I digest einkorn well, along with wheat breads and baked goods that have gone through the sourdough process (which makes grain easier to digest–a practice that has been around for thousands of years). This is why so many of the recipes on the blog feature this grain.
Where Can I Find Einkorn?
Einkorn is slowly gaining popularity, but is still grown in only a few regions in Europe and the US (some local farms in the US are now growing einkorn).
Einkorn can be grown in very rustic conditions, making it ideal to grow in many different places. Hopefully this will encourage a “rebirth” of this grain and make it easier to find.
You can find einkorn at some Whole Foods and health food stores, Earth Fare, Vitacost, and Amazon. Definitely shop around as prices can vary based on the retailer.
My favorite brand is Jovial Foods since finding their products is fairly easy, and I’ve come to respect this brand as a leader in the real food movement. Another fantastic source for einkorn (flour and berries) is einkorn.com.
Einkorn isn’t the cheapest option. The food industry has a way of producing food in a way that cheapens our view of the actual cost of growing and raising food, making it hard for us to see the true cost in producing something when corners aren’t cut.
When you buy einkorn, you’re supporting smaller farms and high quality food. You can also support smaller famers and high quality food when buying other varieties of wheat.
I’m a big believer in variety, from both a health perspective and budget approach. This means baking with more than just einkorn.
In my own kitchen, I also love almond flour (used to make this waffle recipe, almond flour banana muffins are my favorite, and this almond flour banana bread), oat flour (just grind up some oats–as seen in this pancake recipe), and spelt.
As Michael Pollan says, “Spend more, eat less. Americans are as addicted to cheap food as we are to cheap oil. We spend only 9.7% of our income on food, a smaller share than any other nation. Is it a coincidence we spend a larger percentage than any other on health care (16%)? All this ‘cheap food’ is making us fat and sick. It’s also bad for the health of the environment. The higher the quality of the food you eat, the more nutritious it is and the less of it you’ll need to feel satisfied.” (source)
How Can I Use Einkorn?
Einkorn, as a whole grain (the actual berry), can be cooked like rice. Enjoy it as-is or tossed with veggies to make a salad. I recommend following this recipe when cooking the berries.
When it comes to baking, you can either grind the berries in a mill, at home, or purchase the flour pre-milled. I go the pre-milled flour route. This mom already has enough on her plate and milling grain isn’t a priority at this point in my real food journey. (progress > perfection)
Einkorn can be harder to bake with compared to modern wheat since it lacks elasticity (the gluten structure is different).
Einkorn doesn’t like to be messed with, so over-kneading or over-working einkorn will result in less than desirable results. I actually love einkorn for this reason. Who wants to spend 10 minutes kneading dough anyway? Not this girl.
18 DELICIOUS USES
Whole wheat and all-purpose einkorn flour may be used to make any baked good you would traditionally make with “regular” wheat or all-purpose flour. Here are just few of my favorite ways to use einkorn flour.
- chocolate cake
- carrot cake
- vanilla cupcakes
- muffins: master recipe, banana muffins, pumpkin spice muffins, banana sourdough muffins, lemon poppy muffins, cinnamon swirl muffins, chocolate zucchini muffins
- scones: blueberry or pumpkin
- pie crust (great for sweet pies like chocolate cream pie, maple-sweetened pumpkin pie, or savory pies like skillet chicken pot pie)
- sandwich bread
- chocolate chip cookies
- oatmeal cookies
- pizza dough
- pancakes: like sheet pan pancakes, mini pancake muffins, and traditional pancakes
- waffles
- dumplings for chicken soup
- Holiday cookies: snickerdoodles, sugar cookies, jam thumbprint
- flaky biscuits
- cinnamon rolls
- flour tortillas
- cornbread
What Does Einkorn Taste Like?
Einkorn has a sweet and slightly nutty taste. It doesn’t have a gritty or rustic taste like you feel and taste with modern whole wheat flours.
Due to the high amount of carotenoids in einkorn, baked goods have a slightly golden color. You can enjoy einkorn for more just baking, too. Try these delicious ways of eating einkorn…
- Einkorn berries are also delicious to make like cooked rice for risotto or a porridge (oatmeal). And you can buy einkorn pasta for spaghetti and meatball nights.
- We love einkorn sourdough crackers, from Jovial Foods, for snacking with cheese (one of our favorite 31 healthy and easy snacks).
How Should I Store Einkorn Flour?
Einkorn is a staple in my real-food pantry, but I don’t store the flour in the dry pantry.
It’s best to store the whole grain (berries) or the milled flour in an air-tight container in a cool place.
I purchase einkorn flour in bulk amounts (multiple bags at one time) from a local health food store. If you’re planning to buy a large amount, the berries and pre-milled flour are best stored in the fridge or freezer. The berries and flour will keep this way for about 6 months.
I recommend storing any grain, flour, or nut/seed this way to prevent the ingredients from going rancid.
Pro Tips for Baking With Einkorn Flour
Now that you know about einkorn, you may be curious about using einkorn in place of “regular” white flour. Jovial states,
“Einkorn may be substituted cup for cup with regular whole wheat flour in some muffin, pancake, cakes and cookie recipes. However, sometimes, the amount of liquid in the recipe needs to be reduced by roughly 15-20%.”
4 Must-Know Baking Tips
Knowing that einkorn is different, with a different texture and taste than modern wheat, is important to successfully use this flour. Here’s what to expect when baking with einkorn..
- Einkorn is a slow riser. When you use ingredients like milk and butter or eggs in an einkorn dough, don’t expect the dough to rise quickly as it would with modern all-purpose flour. Instead, give the dough extra time to rise.
- Einkorn absorbs liquids slowly. Give the einkorn batter or dough time to absorb the liquid ingredients. I find that it’s helpful to let a batter, like muffin batter or pancake batter, rest for 10 minutes after whisking and before cooking. After this rest time, you’ll notice the batter is thicker, as the flour has slowly absorbed the liquid ingredients. This is also a good time to determine if you need more liquid when converting a recipe from modern wheat to einkorn flour (which you can do with most recipes).
- Einkorn dough is sticky! Yes, this is normal; nothing is wrong with the recipe. Einkorn dough is much stickier than dough made with modern wheat due to its weaker gluten structure. This is to be expected when working with formed dough, einkorn bread dough, cinnamon roll dough, or pizza dough. Flouring a work surface and your hands is the best way to keep the dough from sticking to you and the counter. When rolling out dough, you’ll need to flour the dough surface so the dough doesn’t stick to the rolling pin. The more you work with einkorn dough, the easier it gets.
- Yeasted einkorn dough doesn’t rise like modern wheat dough. This is particularly true with einkorn bread. Don’t expect big, fluffy dough during the initial rise. Yeasted einkorn dough does not double in size like modern wheat yeasted dough. This can also be expected when baking the dough. You’re not going to end up with huge loaves of bread or massive cinnamon rolls. Einkorn tends to make more compact baked goods when it comes to yeasted breads.
For this reason, until you get used to working with einkorn (it took me lots of personal trial and error in the beginning days), I recommend baking from a recipe that calls specifically for einkorn. The good news is that recipes are being written for einkorn, so it’s easier than ever to incorporate this flour into your lifestyle.
Where to Find Trusted Recipes?
- I have a bunch of einkorn recipes here on the blog.
- Jovial also shares recipes on their site and Carla Bartolucci, the founder of Jovial, wrote a cookbook dedicated to using this grain. In the book, she also dedicates a lot of time to making sourdough with einkorn.
- Naturally Ella is another great resource for einkorn recipes. Erin, the founder, is a vegetarian and has written several recipes using einkorn berries.
- Einkorn.com is another source for recipes. The recipe database isn’t the easiest to search through, so you’ll need to do lots of scrolling to find what you want.
If you want to branch out and experiment on your own, Jovial has a fantastic resource on their site for troubleshooting how to do this.
Use a Scale When Baking
When it comes to baking, I highly recommend using a digital scale to weigh your flour. This isn’t something that most Americans are used to hearing.
We’ve become accustomed to relying on volume (cups) for baking.
But here’s the issue: my cup of flour may not be same as yours. In fact, it’s probably not. There are too many variables involved with volume measurements. This means that my results may be different than your results and vice versa.
When it comes to baking, I recommend weighing the most important ingredients. Plus, weighing ingredients is much easier; just keep adding ingredients to the bowl until the scale essentially tells you to stop. Trust, me it’s easier and way more precise!
This is particularly important when making cookies and cakes, which require precise measurements!
If you’ve ever made a (baked good) recipe and it didn’t turn out quite right (and the recipe is solid), it’s probably because there was too much flour added.
This is far too easy to do with volume measurements. Of course, in order to weigh your ingredients, a recipe creator has to provide you with such numbers. Not everyone does this. I didn’t weigh ingredients for the first few years of this blog. Don’t stress if you find an einkorn recipe and the grams aren’t provided. But if they are provided, it’s best to use them. Your results will be far more accurate.
I’ve been using this scale, which we originally purchased for making coffee (weighing coffee beans), for a few years now. You can find a digital scale for under $20 at any home store or on Amazon.
What’s the Difference Between All-Purpose and Whole Wheat Einkorn Flour?
Whole grain or whole wheat einkorn means that nothing has been removed.
All-purpose means that some of the bran has been removed.
You’ll immediately notice the difference when looking at the two flours. All-purpose einkorn resembles more of a white flour, while whole grain or whole wheat einkorn looks whole wheat flour.
All-purpose flour is the easiest flour to digest, since some of the bran has been removed (the hardest part of a grain to digest).
Both einkorn.com and Jovial sell these options for pre-milled flour. I’ve also read that all-purpose einkorn is lower in phytic acid, if that’s a concern for you.
- Whole wheat einkorn is ideal for most rustic breads (quick breads or yeasted sandwich breads), pancakes, or waffles.
- All-purpose einkorn lends itself nicely to lighter baked goods like muffins, sugar cookies, chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal cookies, and chocolate cake or vanilla cupcakes.
My Interview with Carla from Jovial Foods
I recently asked Carla, from Jovial Foods, to come on the podcast to share all about einkorn. In this episode, we talk about the origin of this ancient grain, the importance of variety within a diet, and how to use einkorn. It’s worth listening to if you want to learn more about einkorn.
5 Easy Recipes for Beginners
Here are a few of my favorite recipes that are easy to make when you’re just getting started with einkorn. These recipes will help you get used to the feel of einkorn, in both a batter and dough form. If you want more recipes, check out 10 All-Time Best Einkorn Flour Recipes.
1. Pancakes
This recipe uses either whole grain einkorn flour or all-purpose flour. The pancakes are one of the easiest ways to experiment with einkorn flour.
I also love to make einkorn sheet pan pancakes or turn the pancakes into mini muffins for dunking in maple syrup.
2. Muffins
Muffins do require a bit more effort than pancakes, but they’re still easy to make. This master recipe will give you a feel for how typical einkorn batter looks and feels. If you’re looking for a savory muffin recipe, try this fun variation on pizza.
Other favorite muffins: chocolate zucchini muffins, banana-maple muffins, pumpkin spice muffins, and cinnamon swirl muffins. And if you want to try sourdough, sourdough banana muffins.
3. Pizza Dough
Pizza dough is a great way to get a feel for yeasted einkorn dough. This recipe calls for active dry yeast. You could certainly substitute this ingredient for a couple tablespoons of sourdough starter and extra resting time. You’ll notice that this recipe calls for very little kneading, something you don’t generally find with a wheat-based recipe. Remember, yeasted einkorn dough is much stickier than wheat dough, so flour the surface (parchment paper) and the dough before rolling it out.
4. Cookies
Is there anything like a fresh-from-the-oven cookie? A great introduction to the delicious flavor of einkorn flour is to make einkorn chocolate chip cookies, oatmeal cookies (with raisins or chocolate chips, if you’d like), or sugar cookies.
5. Dumplings
This chicken noodle and dumpling soup is my favorite recipe to make during the fall and winter months. The dumplings are what make this chicken soup AMAZING and they’re made with einkorn flour.
Recently learning about einkorn, I have made a deep dive into baking all sorts of stuff with it. I have had a number of failures as I learn about the properties of this remarkable grain. I purchased a Mockmill 200 to make my own flour, and a superfine sieve to turn whole grain flour into all purpose with just a few minutes of added effort. I am finally realizing that adjusting the liquid in recipes when substituting einkorn for modern wheat is the key rather than increasing the flour. So this will actually make future experimenting easier.
Einkorn probably won’t replace all flour in all my baking, but it is beoming the flour of choice. I love the taste, which can be enhanced with a little egg and/or sugar. Next round of experimentation is artisan whole grain einkorn rye bread. Should be fun along the way as I get to the right blend of flours, leaven, and liquid. Will also be buying whole grain rye to make my own flour.
That’s awesome, Max! Thank you for sharing. Excited to hear what you make.
The article says the gluten structure is weaker, but at the same time states that it can be substituted cup for cup. This seems counterintuitive since the final product won’t have the same structure. Also, the article recommends weighing the flour, but offers no conversion of how much to weigh instead of one cup. Then the article and Q&A proceed to discuss in cups instead of weights. So, can I expect my cornbread to stay intact or will it fall apart? Will my pie crust be too tender and crumble? How much flour should I weight per cup of flour? Thanks.
Hey Donna, Most recipes, like what you mention, that call for all purpose flour do just fine with substituting 1:1 with all-purpose einkorn four for the weight/cup measurement. Here are more tips for substitution that you may find helpful: https://jovialfoods.com/einkorn-baking-tips/ Where it can get a bit tricky is with delicate baked goods, like cookies or yeasted breads. The gluten structure just means you don’t want overwork the dough as this can cause issues.
Also, I have an einkorn cornbread here: https://livesimply.me/easy-homemade-skillet-cornbread/ and pie crust: https://livesimply.me/how-to-make-a-pie-crust-einkorn-spelt-whole-wheat/
Do you bake sprouted einkorn the same as unsprouted?
Hey Vicki, For sprouted flour, it can be a bit more dense when baking (particularly whole wheat sprouted einkorn). So in these cases, you may want to decrease the flour by about 1/4 cup.
Thanks for this excellent introduction to Einkorn flour.
hey Kristin
I ve been reading your blog and trying out your cleaning recipes for a few months now and really love what I’m learning. Your blog is so beautifully presented. I tried out the pancake recipe this morning using the einkorn flour and they were amazing!!!! My 3 year loved them. Thank you so much for sharing all your wisdom I am very grateful you do.
Thank you so much! Glad you both love them. 🙂
Is this free of Synthetic Folic? MTHFR friendly?
There aren’t any synthetic ingredients in this flour.
Hi Kristin,
I am super excited to try Einkorn. I am planning on trying your bread recipe but I have a pumpkin muffin recipe that my family already loves so I was wondering how best to switch my all-purpose flour out for einkorn. I saw on here and on Jovial.com that I would have to reduce the liquid content but do I reduce all liquid ingredients bu 10 to 15% or just one. The recipe i use has orange juice, coconut oil, and eggs. Thank you for input and your website!
Hey Jenna, I would reduce all the liquid by that much, then you can add more if needed. Excited for you try einkorn, too.