Swiss Bake French style flours are traditionally milled by artisan millers and the entire flour range is produced from imported French grown wheat or with a blend of locally grown equivalent wheat varieties.
These quality flours from us are a result of our dedication and passion for well-crafted flour. Each year we produce only a limited quantity of each refined flour on order estimates from our most demanding chefs and bakers.
French classification for flour is based on the resulting amount of residue after processing 10 kg of flour in a 600º C furnace. T45 or Type 45 is the lowest and whitest flour with only around 45 grams of mineral contents left after the burning process and no part of the bran (outer enveloping shell of the grain) remaining. Similarly, T150 has around 150 grams of mineral contents and is considered as whole-wheat flour due to high bran leftover.
- T45 Swiss-Bake French Style Flour, 25kg bag
Soft Wheat, White Fine flour for cakes
Pure French style flour, perfect for making high quality cakes and sweets. It is fine, soft and white in colour. It is very light in texture and has very little mineral content. T45 is finely ground flour using the soft wheat varieties.
It is not suitable for bread but is typically used for brioche and sometimes for croissants. T45 refers to the amount of mineral content that is left after burning the flour i.e. T45 has 0.45% mineral content.
T45 flour is equivalent to Type 00 Italian flour, Euro 450 flour type and American Cake flour.
Mineral Content : 0.40% – 0.45%
Protein Content : 8.50% – 9.50%
Key Ingredients: 100% milled soft wheat
Swiss-Bake French style T45 flour is neither bleached nor chlorinated.
- T55 Swiss-Bake French Style Flour, 25kg bag
Hard Wheat White flour for baking
Strong French style White Bread Flour; type T55 is ideal for making bread, puff pastries, croissants and baguettes. This type of flour is best known for making croissants. This Flour gives a light open textured loaf with a crisp crust. It is medium in protein content, and when this protein is mixed with water it forms gluten. Traditional French bread is made with only flour, yeast and water. That’s the reason why good quality flour is a must.
The 55 refers to the amount of mineral content that is left after burning the flour i.e. T55 has about 0.55% mineral content.
T55 flour is equivalent to Type 0 Italian flour, Euro 550 flour type and American all purpose flour.
Mineral Content : 0.50% – 0.55%
Protein Content : 11.0% – 12.0%
Key Ingredients: Wheat Flour, Wheat Gluten, Malted Wheat flour, Cereal Amylase
Swiss-Bake French style T55 flour is non-fortified, unbleached and non-bromated
- T65 Swiss-Bake French Style Flour, 25kg bag
Extra Strong Bread flour for little dark breads
Strong French style little coarse Bread Flour; type T65 is ideal for making baguettes and artisan dark breads. This type of flour is best known for making baguettes. This flour gives a light open textured loaf with a crisp crust. It is high in protein content and has phenomenal fermentation tolerance.
The 65 refers to the amount of mineral content that is left after burning the flour i.e. T65 has about 0.65% mineral content.
T65 flour is equivalent to Type 1 Italian flour, Euro 650 flour type and high gluten bread flour.
Mineral Content : 0.60% – 0.65%
Protein Content : 12.0% – 13.5%
Key Ingredients: Wheat Flour, Wheat Gluten, Malted Wheat flour, Cereal Amylase
Swiss-Bake French style T65 flour is non-fortified, unbleached and non-bromated
T150 Swiss-Bake French Style Flour, 25kg bag
Coarse ground wholemeal flour for baking
Wholemeal French style coarse Flour; type T150 is ideal for making whole wheat, high fibre artisan breads and baguettes. This type of flour is best suited for all your whole wheat baking needs. This flour gives a brown textured loaf with a crisp crust. It is high in mineral content & protein and gives a nice wholemeal aroma. This wholesome flour gives nutrition, texture and flavour of wholemeal (including bran & germ)to everything that you bake with it.
The 150 refers to the amount of mineral content that is left after burning the flour i.e. T150 has about 1.50% mineral content.
T150 flour is equivalent to Type 2 Italian flour, Euro 1150 flour type and whole meal bread flour.
Mineral Content : 1.25% – 1.50%
Protein Content : 12.0% – 13.5%
Key Ingredients: Whole Wheat Flour, Wheat Gluten, Malted Wheat flour, Cereal Amylase
Swiss-Bake French style T65 flour is non-fortified, unbleached and non-bromated
- Pizza Flour, Swiss-Bake Pizza Flour, 25kg bag
Perfect Pizza flour
Perfect Pizza flour made using custom blend of durum and all-purpose flour along with dough conditioners and functional enzymes. It is fine milled flour with higher protein content for a perfect crust. This flour shows outstanding fermentation tolerance, good water absorption and improved strechibility strength. The dough is easy to shape and gives crispiness to the baked crust.
Swiss-Bake Pizza flour is equivalent to Type 00 Italian flour and other imported Pizza flour.
Mineral Content : 0.45% – 0.50%
Protein Content : 11.0% – 12%
Key Ingredients: Wheat Flour, Dough Conditioners, Malted Wheat flour, Cereal Amylase, Salt
Swiss-Bake Pizza flour is non-fortified, unbleached and non-bromated.
Our Rye Flour gives a dense and dark texture with full rye flavour. This flour can be used in combination with refined wheat flour to make varieties of rye sandwich breads and other artisan rye breads.
- Rye Flour, Swiss-Bake Rye Flour, 25kg bag
Rye Flour Type 1150
This dark medium granulation flour is milled from imported German rye grains and grits. It is slightly dark and milled closer to bran than the endosperm. It gives a dense and dark texture with full rye flavour (slightly sour). This flour can be used in combination with refined wheat flour to make varieties of rye sandwich breads and other artisan rye breads.
Rye Flour Type 1150 is equivalent to a medium to dark rye flour.
Mineral Content : 1.25% – 1.35%
Protein Content : 8.0% – 9.0%
Key Ingredients: 100% Rye flour
Swiss-Bake Rye flour is non-fortified, unbleached and non-bromated.
Keywords: Rye flour, German Flour, dark Flour, American Rye, Rye Bread Bakery ingredients, Pumpernickel
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listed here include additives (wheat gluten, malted wheat flour, and cereal amylase). My standard grocery store Canadian wheat flour choices don't have those additions (although "enriched" versions have the additive vitamins / minerals) and they don't seem to be needed. It wouldn't have occurred to me that basic flour would require those additives --- I'll have to be very aware of the ingredient lists when I choose to experiment with new flour types and sources.
I think comparing ash content to fine-ness of grind is misleading. "T45 flour is equivalent to Type 00 Italian flour," etc
”Type 00” has nothing to do with the fine-ness of the grind and actually is a value to describe a certain level of ash content.
The fact is, the label Tipo "00" has nothing to do with protein content. Rather, it refers to the fineness of the milling. Tipo "00" is the finest grade of flour milled in Italy, and it has a consistency similar to baby powder.
Oh no, not again!
https://www.theartisan.net/flour_ash_content.htm
Lance
Unlike in North America, where wheat flour is categorized by its protein content, in Europe flour is categorized by how finely it is milled. The scale is numbered from 2 to 00, where 2 is the coarsest grind and 00 the finest, with a consistency almost like baby powder. The finer the flour, the smoother and more silky the resulting dough will be, which in turn produces a softer baked product.
Not directly. Those flours are specified in terms of their ash content. It may be the case that to get the very lowest ash content you have to mill and sift so as to get a finer flour. But that's not how they are specified.
TomP
The ash content of flour is an interesting subject for bakers.The ash content of flour refers to the mineral content which is measured by burning the sample of flour to ash and then measuring what’s left. This Traditional method for detection of ash content in wheat flour mainly rely on the physical methods and chemical methods, such as weighing the ash after scorching and configure reagents to measure precipitates. Science advanced, and near-infrared spectroscopy, in the range of 908–1676 nm, has replaced the old detection of ash content. Now, infrared spectroscopy is used to detect total protein and wet gluten content in wheat flour. Hope is that future data fusion will be able to provide more comprehensive information, however, work that implements data fusion analysis in wheat flour quality detection has not been achieved.
The wheat kernel consists of three parts: the endosperm, bran, and germ. The endosperm, which contains all the gluten-forming proteins, makes up the majority of the wheat kernel. What we refer to as “white flour” is essentially just the endosperm, separated from the bran and germ. Since most of the mineral content resides in the bran and germ of the grain, high extraction flours (more whole grain flours) generally have more ash content. However according to studies done, mineral content is not only reserved to the bran/germ of the grain and different types of grain can have different amounts of mineral content even with a low extraction (whiter flour). Flour types are not so easily compared as French flour is measured as a percentage of dry matter and US flour is measured at a certain hydration level. So a drier French flour might have higher ash and protein content simply because it’s more desiccated (or concentrated) because of being measured against it’s dry state. A more humid flour would contain higher water content and so seem like it had less ash and less protein but if you dried (dehydrated) the flour so it had the same water content as the French flour it might have a more similar ash and protein content.
So in general for a home baker, a higher ash content will generally mean flour that has a higher extraction rate (more whole grain particles left in the flour). Additionally, the water absorption capacity of flour increases with higher ash content, due to the higher presence of bran. Higher ash will contribute to the flavor of the bread and the nutrient quality, but will also compromise the gluten strength. These bran particles act like tiny blades, physically cutting through developing gluten strands. This leads to a tighter, less open crumb structure in the final product. The higher the ash content, the more significant the impact on crumb structure. The outer portions of the grain contains most of the protein so testing for protein along with the ash content is done for an analysis of what types of baked goods the flour is suitable for. Lower protein flour is more beneficial for baked products that need to be tender like cakes, pastry, cookies, and scones. Higher protein flour is more useful for breads, pizza and bagels. Flour with higher amounts of bran/germ particles may be higher in protein, but the protein bonding will be compromised by the cutting action of the particles. Milling a flour to a very fine state can help overcome the gluten degradation which occurs with the higher extraction (more of the whole grain remains) rate flour types. Wheat standards for Europe can be found here: https://www.tusaf.org/Eklenti/367,sandrozaniratowheat-flour-standards-in-eupdf.pdf
Durum (hard) wheat protein content
Durum wheat (Triticum durum) has a high-protein content of around 15%. It has a amber endosperm and white bran and is commonly used for making pasta and semolina products.
Hard red spring wheat protein content
Hard red spring wheat has a protein content of 12-15%. Some hard red spring wheat varieties may have higher protein content, with some cultivars having protein content as high as 16% to 18%. This high-protein class of wheat is often the most expensive bread wheat. Millers and Bakers frequently use this wheat class to make whole wheat for harder breads and rolls like bagels and artisan style breads.
Soft red wheat and soft white wheat protein content
Soft red and soft white wheat are low-protein classes of wheat that typically have a protein content of 8.5 to 10.5%. People commonly use it to make cakes, pastries, crackers, Asian-style noodles, and other snack foods. It has a lower gluten content than other wheat types, resulting in a lighter, softer product.
Winter wheat, grown in the fall and harvested in the spring, has a lower protein content 10 to 13% when compared to spring wheat. Examples of winter wheat include hard red winter, and hard white.
Spring wheat is planted in the spring and harvested in late summer or early autumn, with a protein content of 12.0% to 15.0%. Spring wheat examples include durum, hard red spring, and hard white.
Macronutrient Comparison
When it comes to macronutrients, red and white wheat are very similar. They are both excellent sources of carbohydrates and are relatively low in fat. However, red wheat is slightly higher in protein, with 12% protein by weight compared to white wheat's 10% protein content. Protein is essential for building and repairing tissues in the body, so choosing red wheat over white wheat can be beneficial for those who are looking to increase their protein intake.
Vitamin and Mineral Content
Both types of wheat contain essential vitamins and minerals, but red wheat is the clear winner in this category. It is particularly rich in B vitamins, including niacin, thiamine, and riboflavin, which are essential for energy production and maintaining a healthy nervous system. Red wheat also contains more iron and zinc than white wheat, which are important for maintaining a healthy immune system and preventing anemia.
In addition to these vitamins and minerals, red wheat also contains antioxidants, which can help to protect the body against damage from free radicals.
Fiber Content
Fiber is essential for maintaining digestive health and reducing the risk of chronic diseases. Red wheat contains more fiber than white wheat, making it the better choice in this category. Fiber can help to promote feelings of fullness, which can be beneficial for those who are trying to lose weight. It can also help to regulate blood sugar levels, which is important for those with diabetes.
Overall, both red and white wheat are nutritious choices, but red wheat may have some additional health benefits due to its higher protein, vitamin, mineral, and fiber content.
Understanding the role of wheat protein in flour milling
Wheat’s protein content affects the milling process in several ways. The higher the protein content of a wheat class, the more difficult it is to grind into flour.
High-protein wheat flour requires more energy to reduce the endosperm into flour sized particles and as a result requires a longer temper time to mellow the endosperm.
In addition, high-protein wheat flour tends to have larger particles and therefore a coarser texture when milled. Low protein wheat, on the other hand, has smaller particles and therefore a finer flour.
Protein production in wheat requires nitrogen. To increase the protein content of any given wheat crop it can require MORE nitrogen fertilizer to achieve the objective of high-protein wheat. This increases input costs for farmers, making high-protein wheat varieties more expensive to grow. Also, several factors affect wheat’s protein content, the climate, soil quality (which the US large corporation farming has destroyed with monocrop farms), and growing conditions all influence the grain’s captured nitrogen thus, affecting its protein content. This means why you see the US flours labeled ENRICHED. VolMAX is on of the additives that touts: Flour millers now have the opportunity to optimize their principle raw material cost by sourcing cheaper lower protein wheat. “Introducing volMAX, an enzyme technology that allows millers to blend soft, low-protein wheat with high-protein wheat and achieve the flour performance that meets customer expectations.” How does it work? volMAX products improve loaf volume, water absorption, and crumb texture. Dough extensibility and handling are enhanced with high P/L characteristic flours. Higher ash flours, even up to 10-12% bran inclusion can produce bread with volume and texture characteristics similar to premium white breads. For me and my family, that is a NO THANK YOU!!
The amount of gluten in wheat is proportional to its protein content and typically makes up 70% to 75% of the total protein content. Gluten formation is key to a finished baking product’s overall texture and flavor. The wheat’s protein content also determines the dough’s strength and elasticity. High-protein wheat varieties often have stronger doughs which can affect the dough’s elasticity. These doughs are better able to hold gas and retain their shape during baking, resulting in a more uniform volume of the finished product.
If I use pre-milled flour, I buy Grandi Molini Italiani 00 organic for cakes/pastries, and Francine Organic French Wheat Flour T55 for breads/rolls. I buy several types of sprouted Organic whole wheat berries from Azure Standard. I use the red and white winter wheat for breads, and soft red and white summer wheat for pastries. Also, at home, if I want a “whole grain” loaf that rises well, I will grind the hard whole grains very, very fine. I will actually run it through my MockMill 2-3 times, which is a major PIA, but my family does not like the “whole grain” bread flavor much, so I only have to do this if making bread for friends.
If you are interested in other grains, that can be milled for baked goods, or used in other recipes, try this link: https://chefstandards.com/ancient-grains/
I’ve said enough…..BYE!
The link provided by @albacore leads to a security message and block on Firefox. So, to show the info that that website would have provided, here are some links on Italian flour grading:
https://www.cooksinfo.com/italian-flours#google_vignetteIgnore this linkhttps://www.normattiva.it/uri-res/N2Ls?urn:nir:stato:decreto.del.presidente.della.repubblica:2001-02-09;187!vig=
https://www.pianetapane.it/centro-informazione-farine-la-normativa-italiana/
with this time waster! They're clearly not a real user...
@alcophile - That cooksinfo link isn't helping! I mean it literally says the same incorrect thing about fine and coarseness.
Please impart your wisdom in this subject. It would be nice to know.
I removed the cooksinfo link and added links to other Italian sites describing the flour. The confusion about Italian flour type extends even to author Dan Lepard who commented on it at BakeryBits. Even he uses sieve characteristics to correlate the Tipo flours:
https://www.bakerybits.co.uk/bakers-blog/what-is-the-meaning-of-the-0-numbers-on-italian-flour
I do believe that it would be difficult to produce a coarse flour with the ash content of a Tipo 00 flour. But I also believe a very fine 100% whole wheat flour could be produced with exhaustive milling, not that a miller would do that. So I think Dan Lepard isn't entirely accurate in his description, either.
Is it possible that this confusion results from a previous standard for Italian flours that relied on sieve dimensions?
I wonder about this, with roller milling. As I understand it, roller mills are very flexible in how they can be adjusted. First you would want to split off the outer layers, and even the outer parts of the endosperm. Then you would adjust the rollers to pulverize the remaining interior endosperm . Of course, in a commercial mill these passes would all be done using different rollers. After this, it might only take a standard sifting to get your type 00 flour. It's probably not possible at all using grinding stones.
It seems to me that this would only work with certain wheat types, and you'd need to get a good uniform supply of wheat berries and very consistent pre-milling hydration.
Maybe a real miller can chime in here and fill in some facts...
After further reading the translated Italian standard, it does seem that coarse Tipo 00 flour is allowed:
Like you, I'm not sure how that would be accomplished, either coarse Tipo 00 or fine Tipo 2 or farina integrale.
I wasn't sure what that description indicates, so:
FARINA 00-GRANITO ***da 5 KG*** (320604.05)
The bag says “Farina Di Grano Tenero” which means “soft wheat flour,” “Tipo” means type, and 00 means fine. Granito Type-00 Flour is a soft wheat professional flour used to make fresh pasta, gnocchi and desserts, as well as for dusting in bread and pastry-making.. It is extracted by milling carefully selected grains, resulting in a “finely grained” rather than “powdery” granular flour. This is what I get when I use my MockMill and grind my own soft wheat berries. It is extremely FINE. Granito does not mean a coarse milled like semolina or the way typical American whole wheat is ground. It can be used on its own or mixed with a durum coarse ground durum “semolina” flour, or strong a finely ground durum wheat flour. Not all durum wheat is semolina! Both semolina and durum wheat flour are products made from ground durum wheat. The endosperm - the nutrients that surround the wheat seeds - is separated from the grain through the milling process, resulting in a coarse ground flour known as semolina. The texture of the semolina is heavier - like hard bread crumbs - and thicker than most ground flours. Durum wheat flour is the “fine” ground powder left over from the milling process and also a semolina product that is further ground. Durum wheat flour is much finer than semolina and is a yellow powder that resembles traditional cooking flours. This might help understand packaging laws in Italy: https://www.pasta-unafpa.org/public/unafpa/pdf/ITALIA.pdf
So sorry, I didn’t readlize it was in Bold face type, but FYI, bold face is not yelling. This is YELLING.
TomP
Bold face type is not yelling, THIS IS YELLING.
Italian flour Type 00, by Law, cannot contain more than 0.55% ash.
Protein content is not considered that important.
If you grind at home, you can judge the ash content by the color. The whiter the flour, the less ash.
The book “Living Bread” is the best place to get all the information that you will ever need on flours grown and milled throughout the world.
All Caps has been considered yelling because the old formats like email didn't support bolding. If you bold a passage, it's a strong emphasis. When your entire post is strongly emphasized, don't be surprised if it comes across as yelling. Anyway, you changed the post to plain text and I appreciate it.
Please note the description for the Italian soft wheat flour that @mwilson linked, especially the term Granuloso (granular):
I am unable to find any mention of particle size included in the Italian standards for Tipo 00 flour. The 00 only refers to the ash content of the flour.
Thank you for unbolding.
I wonder if American cream of wheat would be similar to this granuloso flour. Ash content of cream of wheat ≈0.35%.
I think you are right about that. Maybe I'll get a box and see how it bakes up. It might do for pasta, too.
Thanks for making me aware of that Dan Lepard article. It just goes to show how dire the situation is when even an esteemed baker can't get it right. Although I shouldn't be surprised since even flour mills outside of Italy don't understand what these classifications mean either.
There's several inaccuracies in Dan's article:
I think he just made that part up about the sieve sizes. Other than some marketing spin there is no legal existence of type 0000 or 000 in Italy, these types do exist in Argentina however. Dan not being aware of this is telling of lacklustre research.
Dan also gets the alveograph info wrong. The "PL" number he states, more accurately the P/L value is not just describing extensibility, rather it's the ratio of resistance vs extensibility and his examples are back to front. Lower numbers would mean more extensible not the other way around.
Also, I reject the idea that Pizza needs high gluten, it depends on maturation time and type of pizza. Inherently pizza is a flat bread which means you don't need a flour with lots of strength. This is a basic principle.
Here in the UK there's a bag of flour I can buy made with half Durum and half bread wheat that's labelled as type 00. This product could not legally exist in Italy, since Durum is not defined by the numbered type system. Nor could any blend of the two wheats be sold as flour.
Regarding the confusion allow me to break down some important points:
Firstly, the reason flour is classified by ash (ceneri).
In Italy, types 00,0,1,2 and Integrale have been formally defined by ash content since at least 1967. In 2001 some values were adjusted to account for improved wheat growing quality (higher protein and higher mineral content minimums) and the cellulose column was removed. Pre 1967, prior to the formal classifications, flour was graded by extraction rate.
Without elaborating too much, there was a time when refined flour was most prized and there are technical reasons for that also, better storage life, lighter textured bread, better gluten quality - the best quality gluten is in the central part of the endosperm.
So for all European countries bringing in legislation that classed flour by ash was a more regulated way to grade flour that approximated extraction rate. Flour could be tested after it left the mill whereas you couldn't perform a test that would tell you the specific extraction rate.
Of course, to refine flour it needs to be sifted and of course there will be sieves of varying mesh apertures. You would have to ask an old Italian miller if there is any historical attachment to a similar numbered system of mesh sizes, I suspect if there were it is long defunct.
Secondly, the reason for particle size variations.
There seems to be a misunderstanding that presumes a correlated relationship between extraction rate and fineness - while vaguely true in isolation this completely overlooks the primary reason which determines variations in particle size, that is kernel hardness - the hardness of the endosperm.
Grano Tenero - common wheat milled to Tipo 00 typically has an extraction rate of about 50% and Durum Wheat (Grano Duro) Semola can have a similar extraction rate of about 50% yet the Durum Semola is vastly coarser (Semola may be milled finer to Semola rimacinata). These differences in particle size and distribution are attributable to the physical structure of the kernel.
Simply, coarse flour is factor of kernel hardness, and kernel hardness is attributable to protein content. But other factors, such as wheat variety and moisture content play a part. The endosperm of soft wheat kernels can become powdery fine with very little force. Such that you can't obtain coarse flour (semolina) from soft wheat kernels.
Since at least 1967, Tipo 00,0,1,2 and Integrale are designations of mineral (ash) content. Any talk of fineness is a distraction and the existence of Granito flours is proof of this!
Hope this helps.
Michael
Thanks for the info!)
Thanks that was useful. I've often wondered about these things but just found a recipe with 1150 rye flour mentioned and 1050 wheat flour so I had to investigate.