What Type of Flour Should I Use?
Ever wonder why there are so many different kinds of flour on the store shelves? I used to get confused about what kind of flour I needed and didn't fully understand that one type of flour can't do it all. Here's a picture of the different flours I have right now in my pantry.
From left: bread flour, whole wheat flour, White Lily (all purpose) flour, cake flour, and Pillsbury (all purpose flour).
Why on earth does one person need all these kinds of flour? Well, I do a lot of baking. For baking cakes, I like to use a mixture of Cake Flour and the White Lily Flour. For bread, I use mixture of Bread Flour and Whole Wheat Flour. The other all purpose flour is what I use to "flour the counter" to roll out biscuits and stuff like that.
Fair warning - I am a fan of Alton Brown, so this will start to get a little scientific. These flours react differently because of the varying protein content in them. The higher the protein content, the more the gluten will develop. If you want a bread that rises nice with a soft texture, use bread flour. You can use all-purpose, but it will not give you the same results. I like wheat bread so I mix in some whole wheat flour with the white bread flour. I have used whole wheat by itself, which will give you a slightly coarser texture.
For cakes, I want a much finer texture (this is called the "crumb"). That's why I use a mixture of cake flour and White Lily flour. OK...stay with me here. White Lily is milled from a soft winter wheat (I believe from the south). It has a protein content of somewhere between a cake flour and regular all-purpose. It's supposed to be great for biscuits. I'll have to try that out sometime. If any of you use it for biscuits, let me know. I cheat a little and use Bisquick for biscuits.
Then, there is self-rising, which is just regular all-purpose with leavening added in. That is the one flour I don't have in my kitchen right now.
Hope this little explanation has helped demistify the types of flour you may find on your grocery shelves.
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