Generally, some people think that baking bread involves tossing flour, butter, and other basic ingredients together, but some bread recipes call for specific types of ingredients, such as baker’s flour.
If you are looking for a way to amp up your bread recipes, you may be wondering what baker’s flour is and if baker’s flour is good. I looked up the facts, and here is what I found!
What Is Baker’s Flour?
Baker’s flour is a type of Canadian-grade all-purpose wheat flour that is often used for making bread. Generally, baker’s flour is made from high-grade wheat flour that is very high in protein and gluten, which creates the ideal texture that people want in bread. Moreover, baker’s flour may also be called bread flour or strong flour.
Do you want to learn more about how baker’s flour is used, what substitutes for baker’s flour are, and if you can use baker’s flour for cakes.
What Is In Baker’s Flour?
Typically, baker’s flour is made from all-purpose wheat flour, which is normally Canadian-grade. It may vary on the manufacturer, but you can expect most baker’s flour to be created from hard wheat kernels.
Additionally, baker’s flour may come as either white flour or whole wheat flour depending on the wheat and processing methods used for the baker’s flour.
Occasionally, baker’s flour may contain ascorbic acid, which is a form of vitamin C, to condition baker’s flour to increase the volume of the dish that will also add more texture to the bread.
Does Baker’s Flour Have Other Names?
Since baker’s flour is almost always used to create bread, many people will call baker’s flour bread flour, and bread flour is the more commonly used term.
However, some people may also refer to baker’s flour as strong flour since baker’s flour is made from hard wheat kernels since they provide more “strength” to the dough.
What Is The Purpose Of Baker’s Flour?
Normally, baker’s flour is meant to be used in baked goods that involve yeast since baker’s flour contains the ideal ingredients for most baked goods.
For instance, baker’s flour contains around 12-14% protein, which is higher than most other types of flour, and the higher protein content creates more gluten, aiding bread to have better chew and texture.
Baker’s flour’s strength from the protein allows the dough to rise without collapsing before the yeast works, which is what you want to have from dough for bread.
What Is Baker’s Flour Used For?
Typically, the main use for baker’s flour is to create bread, especially for bread that requires a bit more chew.
However, baker’s flour can be ideal for most bread recipes that include yeast since the protein content in baker’s flour aids bread recipes that have yeast.
Moreover, some people swap all-purpose flour for baker’s flour if they want chewier results. For instance, some people use baker’s flour instead of all-purpose flour for pizza dough to create a denser and chewier crust.
Can You Use Baker’s Flour For Cakes?
Generally, baker’s flour is not ideal for cakes because baker’s flour is meant for bread due to baker’s flour’s high gluten and protein content.
Since baker’s flour offers a lot of texture, chew, and volume, baker’s flour often creates dense, tough, and chewy results, which you do not want to have in cakes.
Is Baker’s Flour High-Grade Flour?
Technically, most baker’s flour is considered high-grade flour because high-grade flour usually refers to high-protein flour or strong flour, which is what baker’s flour is.
Thanks to baker’s flour’s high protein content, the term high-grade flour may be used interchangeably with baker’s flour.
Is Baker’s Flour The Same As Self-Rising Flour?
Baker’s flour is not the same as self-rising flour because they have different ingredients and purposes in baking.
For instance, baker’s flour is usually meant for bread, and baker’s flour is usually only wheat flour that contains a lot of gluten and protein.
On the other hand, self-rising flour is typically a mixture of salt, baking soda, and all-purpose flour.
Generally, self-rising flour lets dishes rise without yeast, which is why self-rising flour is ideal for soft cakes.
However, baker’s flour is best for recipes that have yeast since the protein content of baker’s flour can aid yeast during the dough-making process.
Is Baker’s Flour The Same As Bread Flour?
Technically, baker’s flour is the same as bread flour since they are simply different names for each other.
However, some manufacturers may create slight differences in their baker’s flour and bread flour.
For instance, some manufacturers may create bread flour to make denser bread recipes while also creating baker’s flour that is meant to make a lighter and fluffier batter.
Therefore, it is best to look into the manufacturer of your baker’s flour before using it to see how the baker’s flour will work in your recipes.
What Is A Substitute For Baker’s Flour?
If you are not too fussy about the texture of your recipes, you can use all-purpose flour instead of baker’s flour for an easy substitute.
However, you may opt to add vital wheat gluten into the all-purpose flour if you want to mimic baker’s flour’s gluten content, especially if you want chewier and denser bread.
Another alternative to baker’s flour is by adding a bit of cornflour to regular flour since some cornflour contains wheat starch that will add more gluten to the plain flour, which is ideal if you need baker’s flour to bake bread.
Have a look at our other articles to discover what buckwheat flour is, what maida flour is, and what mesquite flour is.
Conclusion
Baker’s flour is flour most commonly used to create bread since baker’s flour contains a lot of protein and gluten, which results in denser and chewier bread.
However, baker’s flour can go by many other names, such as strong flour, bread flour, and high-grade flour, but they are almost used interchangeably.
Moreover, some people may opt to use baker’s flour for non-traditional purposes to get chewier results, such as pizza dough.