by Annmarie Kostyk

Created on: June 08, 2010

Unless you have worked in a bakery or in a professional kitchen, you may not know the difference between flour, also know as all-purpose flour, and cake flour.  Staring with the basics, these flours are all made from wheat.  If the flour is made from another grain it will say so on the package The most important aspect of flour is the content and quality of the gluten in the flour.   Hard red winter wheat and soft red wheat are used for all-purpose flours and soft red wheat is used to make cake flour.  All-purpose flour has 7-12 grams of protein in it and cake flour only has 7-8 grams of protein. If you enjoy baking and cooking, you should have both all-purpose and cake flour in you kitchen pantry. 

All-purpose flours vary in composition from region to region throughout North America.  The all-purpose flours in the South and Pacific Northwest have less protein in them than the all-purpose flours of the rest of the United States and Canada.The flour may be unbleached or bleached.  Unbleached does not mean whole grain, it simply means that it is not as white, not bleached.  It's quite soft to the touch.  All-purpose flour is packaged in a bag. In Britain, all-purpose flour is known simply as flour. You can make cookies, breads, pancakes and pastries with all-purpose flour.  You can even make cake with it.  Cake?  Yes, cake.  If you are making a cake that is heavy and dense like a chocolate cake, use all-purpose flour.  Some of the popular brands of all-purpose flour on your grocer's shelf are Gold Medal, King Arthur's, Ceresota,  Pillsbury, Hodgson Mill, Martha and White Lily

Cake flour is completely different form all-purpose flour and they are not interchangeable.  Not ever in the same measurements.  Cake flour is treated with chlorine dioxide which is a chlorine gas.  This treatment effects the starch of the flour.  It also leaves a bit of hydrochloric acid which lends a slightly acidic taste to the end product.  Cake flour has the least amount of gluten among all of the flours.  Why is this important?  It makes for a lighter cake.  Cake flour is bright in appearance and feels soft to the touch.  Cake flour is packaged in a box and will most often not be located on the grocer's shelf near the flour.  You will most likely find it closer to the cake mixes.  Britain calls its cake flour soft flour.  You can use cake flour for other things beside cake.  You can use it for genoise, biscuits and cookies that should be soft rather than crisp after they are cooked. There are fewer brand choices out there for cake flour.  The most prominent cake flours are Swans, PIllsbury Softasilk and Queen Guinevere.

If you are baking something that calls for cake flour and you only have all-purpose flour, you can make your own.  One cup of sifted cake flour can be substituted with 3/4 cup sifted, bleached all-purpose flour and two tablespoons of cornstarch. 

If you need all-purpose flour and only have cake flour, use one cup plus one tablespoon cake flour for every cup of all-purpose flour the recipe calls for.

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