What is a Cake Flour?
Cake flour is a low-protein flour that’s milled into a fine consistency. It contains about 7-9% protein, while all-purpose flour, a harder flour, has anywhere between 10-12%. What does this mean for baking? You see, protein content is directly related to gluten formation.
Best Cake Flour In Kenya
1. All-Purpose Flour
All-purpose flour is a kind of wheat flour that can be used for multiple uses, hence the name all-purpose. It’s the most common, easily available, and economical wheat flour found in most shops, supermarkets, and wholesale shops.
All-purpose flour can be used to bake cakes, cookies, scones, doughnuts etc. A packet of 2Kg ranges from Kshs. 125-140 depending on the brand.
2. Self-Rising Flour
This is a wheat flour that has a chemical rising agent added to an all-purpose flour. It’s used for cakes where recipes have little or no rising agent required, cookies, sponges, and biscuits. A packet of 2Kg costs Kshs. 125 – 140 depending on the brand.
3. Bakers’ Flour
Bakers flour is a wheat flour that has a high gluten content. Gluten is the protein found in wheat flour that makes it sticky. This flour is used for breads, buns & other bread products. It is particularly good for those products since the dough is able to be proofread properly without collapsing and to its full capacity.
4. Whole Wheat Flour
Whole wheat flour is a whole meal flour that is very healthy and nutritious. It’s when the wheat is milled together with the skin for a whole meal of wheat flour. This wheat flour is not easy to bake on its own since the gluten content is very low.
5. Atta Flour
Atta flour is another form of whole meal wheat flour, it’s made from durum wheat from India and is mainly used for chapatis but can also be used while baking whole wheat breads.
It can be one of the wheat flours you combine with a whole wheat flour and bakers flour. It is also a highly nutritional flour. You can also use it to make mandazis and doughnuts.
What flour do professional bakers use for cakes?
Pastry flour
Pastry flour is the middle ground between cake flour and all-purpose flour. Professional bakers love that it’s finely milled with a protein content that hovers around eight to nine percent, striking the perfect balance between flakiness and tenderness while maintaining structure.
What type of flour makes cakes more delicate and tender?
cake flour
A cake with all-purpose flour substituted for cake flour is more likely to have a slightly coarser crumb, while a cake made with cake flour will have a finer, more even crumb and enhanced tenderness.