13 great tips for using flour in your Baking…
1.As I am sure you know there are two types of flour, strong (high-gluten) and weak (low-gluten). The strong is for bread making and the weak is for cakes and biscuits.
2. Deciding which flour to choose to bake with is another question often asked. Self-raising or plain flour? Self-raising gives you a good balance of raising agents, but with plain flour, you can control what you add. Generally, they say 2 ½ tsp Baking Powder should be added to every 250g/8oz plain flour.
3. They also say that sifting flour makes a ‘lighter’ cake.
4. Sift your flour and baking powder together 2 – 3 times when making a cake, as it will give your cake a very light and even texture and stop air pockets from forming.
5. To avoid your pie crust from becoming too soggy, sprinkle it with equal parts of sugar and flour before adding filling.
6. Flour in baking, a high gluten flour would be used for bread and a low gluten flour for cakes.
7. So use flours with high protein content such as strong and durum, for breads and pasta. Use plain flour which has a low protein content for baking cakes, pastries and biscuits and also for thickening sauces.
8. With so many different types of flours it can mean you get a bit mixed up with one or another, and if you can replace them with another type while you are baking.
9. All-purpose flour has 10-12% protein. Cake flour has 6-8% protein. If you don’t have cake flour, you can substitute ¾ cup sifted all-purpose flour plus 2 tablespoons cornstarch.
10. Bread flour has 12-14% protein; the high protein content causes the bread to rise and gives it shape and structure.
11. High-gluten flour, has an even higher protein content than bread flour and gives baked goods like bagels its characteristic chewy texture.
12. If you run out of self-raising flour just use plain flour and add extra baking powder.
13. Store flour in an airtight container as it keeps better that way.
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