Different types of flour (local vs international)
Hello,
I live in the US and recently started baking. I'm trying to bake a traditional sandwhich bread from my home Lebanon. However, when I went to Lebanon I saw that the flour they use over there is labeled and organized completely differently to the flour in the US. Over there they have Zero, Platinum, Extra, etc... while here we have Bread flour, cake flour, pastry flour, whole wheat, etc.. I'm not able to find a comparison table, and I'm not able to draw the similarities myself so I was hoping someone could explain or at least point me in the right direction.
I'm trying to find the equivalent to this from Crown Flour Mills in Lebanon. It seems to have a more similar to Italian naming convention, but its still not the same.
Are the flour types that we find in stores here equivalents to the international ones, or are they actually different products?
Any help is appreciated, thanks!
The problem is that different countries have different flour specs, there is far from a universal standard. See:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flour
If your "Zero" flour, which is described as a "...Type 75...straight run flour with medium protein quality.", the Type 75 may refer to ash content, as in the French style of labeling. This would put this flour somewhere between all-purpose and high-gluten flour (see the chart on the Wikipedia page above).
If you can get more detailed specifications from the original miller, you may be able to track down flours from other mills in the US that most closely match. Otherwise, you may want to try cutting some high-gluten flour with a little all-purpose flour to achieve the same effect.
Why high gluten?
Thanks, I guess the only way is to experiment.
On their website, they described it as a "straight run flour with medium protein quality". In the US, that describes standard All Purpose flour which is on every grocery shelf.
Straight flour is straight flour, and all-purpose is not straight but long patent.
This is a type of flour that generally is not made by major millers in the US. Smaller specialty/artisan millers occasionally do, for example this flour is close to what you are lookinig for, but cheap it is not.
thanks, i ordered a batch to give it a try