![]() ![]() Sometimes, that agitation isn’t required: In no-knead breads, the gluten development is achieved with hydration and rest, proving you don’t always need to knead. Gluten in breadĪccording to Ellen King, author of Heritage Baking, “Proper gluten development is important for elasticity, how your bread will rise at the end, and how your bread will hold up after it’s shaped.” This is achieved first by adding liquid to the flour, kickstarting the gluten-forming process, then kneading or folding the dough to form long, strong interconnected strands. To achieve each of these goals, you need to control the extent to which the gluten is developed. (Photo by Maurizio Leo)įor breads, you want a lot of dough strength to create chew and trap gas as dough rises, while for cakes and other tender baked goods, you want a delicate texture. Those airy holes are thanks to a strong network of gluten strands. At the same time, those interconnected strands become longer and stronger the more the gluten develops, which leads to more chewiness and toughness in the final product. You know that network of gluten strands we talked about, that forms when dough or batter is agitated? This web is capable of trapping gas bubbles the stronger it is, the more gas it can hold, leading to more air in a baked good and thus a higher rise. How does gluten impact baking?ĭepending on the type of baking you’re doing, you might want a lot of gluten development or as little as possible. Glutenin gives the dough elasticity (so it can snap back like a rubber band), while gliadin contributes extensibility (which means the dough can be stretched). Remember how there were two different types of protein found in flour? They each do something slightly different in dough as gluten develops. That’s because this movement and agitation encourages the gluten strands to link up and form a network, which makes them even stronger. When liquid is added to glutenin and gliadin, they start forming bonds that link together, developing strands of gluten.Īs you mix and knead batters and doughs, you encourage the gluten to develop further. (You can read more in our post on choosing the right flour about how this leads to shorter, denser bread.) That's because bran has sharp edges when ground, which cut some of the gluten strands and interferes with their structure. (Photo by Kristin Teig)Īn important note on whole-grain flours: The total protein content of whole wheat flour is 13.8%, but because whole wheat flour contains all parts of the wheat berry, including the bran and the germ, the gluten structure is affected. King Arthur Unbleached Bread Flour has a protein content of 12.7%, making it "stronger" than all-purpose or cake flour. This means that dough made with bread flour will be stronger than ones made with cake or even all-purpose flour, if they’re all given the same amount of kneading or agitation.Īll-purpose flour, meanwhile, has a protein percentage comfortably in the middle of this range at 11.7%, so that it's well-suited to most baking projects ranging from cakes to breads. Because there’s more protein present, the dough is capable of developing more gluten. When you mix batter made with cake flour rather than all-purpose, less protein is present as a result, the batter will develop less gluten.īread flour, on the other hand, has a protein percentage of 12.7%. One way to think about it: the higher the protein, the “stronger” the flour.Ĭake flour, with a protein percentage of 10%, has low gluten-development potential. The higher that protein content, the more gluten-forming protein a specific type of flour contains. ![]() You’ll find protein content printed on bags of King Arthur flour, ranging from cake flour to all-purpose to bread flour. (Photo by John Sherman) What does flour protein content mean? Is that related to gluten? Protein content is included on the front of King Arthur flour bags. So instead of thinking about how much gluten a certain flour contains, it’s more accurate to think about how much gluten-forming protein the flour contains. When water (or a liquid including water, like milk) is added to these two proteins, they link together, forming gluten. ![]() Gluten is formed from flour when water is added. That bag of all-purpose flour sitting on your counter contains two proteins necessary to form gluten: glutenin and gliadin. So what exactly is gluten?Ī common misconception is that gluten is part of flour. Technically, this isn’t true. But if you’ve got a basic understanding of what gluten is and how it works, that knowledge will take you (and your baking) a long way. It’s hard to talk about gluten without wading into food science, so it can be a confusing topic. It’s the backbone to almost every kind of baking, and yet … many bakers are also baffled by it. Gluten has been feared and revered, misunderstood and maligned. ![]()
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