Types Of Flour

Types Of Flour

Flour types generally vary depending on their use, whether for baking (bread) or making other flour-based products:

Wheat Flour - Or baking flour, the most common source of flour used in making bread. The wheat grain has three basic components – endosperm which produces the starch in flour, germ which produces protein, and bran which holds the fiber. From these three components, basic flour varieties are produced.

Durum Flour – Flour made from durum, the hardest of all wheat grain varieties. They are grounded finely, producing golden-colored flour used in making noodles.

Semolina Flour – Produced from durum wheat that underwent maximum purification process to yield semolina, the coarse, granular byproduct when the fine starch are separated. This flour is used in making pasta (spaghetti, lasagna, macaroni) products.

Additives and enrichments used to replace the nutritional value lost during processing produces certain types of flour. The more common ones include:

  1. Bromated Flour – Flour mixed with bromate, a maturing agent that helps develop gluten for added elasticity and strength. Increased intolerance to bromate by some people and ailments associated with it led to discontinued use of bromate as maturing agent. It is now replaced with malted barley or ascorbic acid.
  2. Bleached Flour – Flour that is bleached using harmless chemicals to make it whiter and increase the gluten content to produce a more palatable baked apperance.
  3. Unbleached Flour – Instead of bleaching chemicals, the flour is exposed to natural gas (oxydation) to induce natural aging, or by using oxydizing agents like nitrogen dioxide or chlorine to hasten the process. This flour appears golden in color and are used in baking yeast breads.
  4. Self-rising flour – Or phosphated flour, is an all-purpose flour infused with leavening agent (baking powder) and salt ideal for baking quick breads and biscuits.
  5. Gluten Flour – Flour with high level of gluten, therefore high in protein. They are used for making specialty breads for diabetic consumers.