What is T55 Flour?
T55 flour is a standard white wheat flour from France. The T stands for Type and the number 55 means that is has an ash content of about 0.55%. It’s very close to a standard all-purpose or plain flour.
What’s the difference between self raising flour and plain flour?
Plain flour only contains ground wheat and doesn’t rise on its own. Self raising flour contains plain flour, baking flour, and a little dash of salt. These ingredients help mixtures puff up automatically.
What is baker’s flour?
Also known as “bread flour”, baker’s flour is a high protein wheat flour milled from hard wheat and typically contains 11% to 14% protein. This protein forms strong, elastic gluten when mixed with water which makes it ideal for structured, chewy yeast risen-baked goods!
How to choose which flour to use
When selecting your flour, you need to factor in the following:
- Your recipe and what you’re making: Are you making yeast risen doughs, or baking a cake? It’s the first step to deciding what type of flour you need.
- Nutrition label: this will allow you to factor in the protein as it directly creates the gluten, which acts as the structure of your baked goods.
- Grain type: white flour can remove the bran and germ for maximum rise and light texture, whole Wholemeal on the other hand requires more wet ingredients and yields a denser bake.
- Bleaching: Unbleached flour naturally ages and is preferred for its flavour and yeast health. Bleached flour is used more for delicate cakes as it uses chemical agents to whiten flour and soften protein.
