Dough properties (maximum resistance, extensibility and dough breakdown), flour protein content, the high-molecular-weight (HMW) subunits of glutenin and gliadin composition were determined in an F 3 population of the bread wheat cross ‘Nuri 70’ x ‘UL 82’. Variation in dough properties was not influenced by protein content. HMW subunits of glutenin, particularly those of the Glu-D1 locus were largely responsible for differences in dough breakdown and maximum resistance but not for extensibility of the dough. The Glu-D1d allele (subunits 5 and 10) inherited from ‘Nuri 70’ was associated with lower dough breakdown and higher maximum resistance than its allelic counterpart Glu-D1a (2 and 12) derived from ‘UL 82’ while the subunits 17 and 18 of the Glu-B1 locus conferred slightly greater dough extensibility. No significant association was observed between the dough properties and gliadin composition in the entire population. However, in the sub-population of lines heterozygous at the Glu-D1 locus, the presence of gliadin components homozygous at one of the Gli-1 loci, derived from the ‘UL 82’ parent, resulted in significantly lower mean dough breakdown values than either the heterozygous condition or parental gliadin components from ‘Nuri 70’.