29.1 Baking's dry ingredients

A bakeshop works with a fairly short list of ingredient groups.

• grains and flours
• fats and oils
• sweeteners
• eggs
• dairy products
• leavening agents, which make things rise
• thickening agents
• fruit
• nuts and seeds
• chocolate and other cocoa products
• spices and flavorings

Salt and water play a part as well.

Next to flour, the dry shelves hold several other staples.

• white and brown sugars
• yeast
• baking soda and baking powder
• cocoa powder
• vanilla

Each does its own job in a formula. Flour comes first because almost every formula starts with it.

Hard wheat and soft wheat

Wheat is sorted as hard or soft. Hard wheat carries more protein, and more protein means stronger gluten, the stretchy network that holds a dough together. Soft wheat carries less, so its gluten is weaker and the crumb is more tender. see chapter 7: Flour

North America grows six types of wheat. Their protein ranges and uses are:

• Hard red winter: 10 to 15% protein. An all-round wheat, good for all-purpose flour, hard rolls, flatbreads and Asian-style noodles.
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• Hard red spring: 12 to 18% protein. On its own its gluten is so strong that bread is hard to shape, so it is mostly blended in to strengthen bread flours. It goes into high-end breads such as artisan loaves, pizza crust, croissants and rolls.
• Soft red: 8 to 11% protein. The weak gluten suits cookies, crackers and pastries.
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• Soft white: 8 to 11% protein and low moisture. It gives a whiter product, so it suits cakes, pastries and some Middle Eastern flatbreads.
• Hard white: a newer wheat grown in the United States, used for whiter wheat breads, Asian noodles and flatbreads.
• Durum: the hardest wheat of all, with 14 to 16% protein and a high gluten content. It goes mainly into pasta, couscous and Mediterranean breads.
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Inside the kernel

A wheat kernel has three parts: the bran outside, the germ, and the endosperm in the middle. Milling breaks the kernel apart and each part finds a use. see chapter 16: What a grain is

• Bran is darker than the inside of the kernel. The brown specks you see in some flour are milled bran; white flour has it taken out. It is rich in fiber, vitamins, minerals, protein and fat.
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• Germ is the part a new wheat plant grows from. It is very high in fat and goes rancid fast, so any flour that keeps the germ has a short shelf life.
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• Endosperm is about 83% of the kernel and is 68 to 76% starch. White flour comes from it. It also holds protein, B vitamins, iron, minerals and soluble fiber.
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Milling in brief

The point of milling is to pull the endosperm away from the bran and germ, since the endosperm is what becomes baking flour. All three parts can be bought.

The first mills crushed or rolled kernels between two big stones. The grind was coarse, but the parts could then be sifted apart, and the work was hard. A few European markets still sell stone-ground flour; in the United States most flour is no longer made that way, and stone-ground grits and cornmeal are the usual stone-ground products. Modern mills use the break system, set out under the next heading.

Strong flours and weak flours

• Bread flour is a strong flour from hard wheat, sold bleached or unbleached, and mostly used by commercial bakeries.
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• High-gluten flour has high protein and forms good gluten.
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• Cake flour is a weak flour from soft wheat. It is usually pure white and feels soft and silky. Its low gluten makes it right for delicate pastries.
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• Pastry flour is weak and low in protein too, but stronger than cake flour. It is a creamy, yellowish color.
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• All-purpose flour is the general flour and the usual choice of home bakers. It can stand in for any of the flours above. Its protein is lower, yet still enough to build good gluten for bread.
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• Self-rising flour comes with leavener already in it: baking powder and salt. Professional kitchens do not use it. Leaveners lose strength with time, and since most formulas already have their own leavener in differing amounts, a scaled recipe could end up with too little and fail.
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Meals

A meal is a coarser grind than flour. Cornmeal is ground from the starchy endosperm of corn, is sold in several styles, and has no gluten. Nut meals are nuts ground fine enough to use like flour; almond and hazelnut are the two most often seen. With no wheat in them, they have no gluten either.