![]() ![]() To make your own pastry flour, mix together 1 1/3 cups A-P flour and 2/3 cup cake flour.īread Flour: With a protein content of 12 to 14 percent, bread flour is the strongest of all flours, providing the most structural support. Pastry flour strikes the ideal balance between flakiness and tenderness, making it perfect for pies, tarts and many cookies. Pastry Flour: An unbleached flour made from soft wheat, with protein levels somewhere between cake flour and all-purpose flour (8 to 9 percent). ![]() Cake flour is generally chlorinated, a bleaching process that further weakens the gluten proteins and, just as important, alters the flour's starch to increase its capacity to absorb more liquid and sugar, and thus ensure a moist cake. The relative lack of gluten-forming proteins makes cake flour ideal for tender baked goods, such as cakes (of course), but also biscuits, muffins and scones. A-P flour is sold bleached or unbleached the two are largely interchangeable, but it's always best to match your flour to your recipe.Ĭake Flour: The flour with the lowest protein content (5 to 8 percent). While not necessarily good for all purposes, it is the most versatile of flours, capable of producing flaky pie crusts, fluffy biscuits and chewy breads. Milled from a mixture of soft and hard wheat, with a moderate protein content in the 10 to 12 percent range, all-purpose flour is a staple among staples. Unless labeled "whole-wheat," all flour is white flour: that is, milled from the starchy, innermost part of the wheat kernel, known as the endosperm.Īll-Purpose Flour: If a recipe calls simply for "flour," it's calling for all-purpose flour. Doughs made from high-protein flours are both more elastic (stretch further) and more extensible (hold their shape better) - desirable qualities in bread and many other yeasted products where a firm structure is paramount, but undesirable in pastries and cakes, where the goal is flakiness or tenderness. And more strength translates into more volume and a chewier texture. High-protein wheat varieties (10 to 14 percent protein) are classed as "hard wheat." Low-protein wheats (5 to 10 percent) are known as "soft wheat." Simply put: More protein equals more gluten equals more strength. Protein content is the primary differentiator in flours. Choose the wrong flour and you're courting trouble. Choose the right flour for the right task and you're a long way toward baking success. Flour - finely milled wheat or other grains - lends structure to baked goods, but different baked goods demand different structural supports. From bread to biscuits, cookies to cakes, baking is the art of turning flour into (delicious) food. ![]()
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