Knead to Know: #1: It All Starts With Flour

Wheat stalk with berries and milled flour

We're starting something new.

Over the next several weeks, we're going to walk through the entire bread-making process from start to finish — one step at a time, one post at a time. No shortcuts. No skipping ahead. Just the way we do it here at The Lakehouse Bakery.

And it starts where every baked good starts: with flour, wheat flour specifically. We'll talk about other grain and nut flours in another post.

Flour selection matters. Not just for bread — for everything. Cookies, cakes, biscuits, pastries, pizza, pasta. The flour you choose determines the structure of what you're making before you ever touch water, yeast, or salt. Pick the wrong one and no amount of technique saves it. This is true whether you're shaping a baguette or mixing up chocolate chip cookies on a Tuesday night.

And here's the bigger picture: all baking and pastry is about control. You're working with a handful of basic ingredients — flour, water, fat, sugar, salt, eggs, leavening — and everything comes down to controlling how they're combined. The ratios. The mixing methods. The temperatures. Flour is where that control starts.

Protein Content Is the Whole Game

Flour is mostly starch, but it's the protein that matters. Again, this is all about wheat flours and all wheat flours have two proteins — glutenin and gliadin. On their own, they don't do much. But add water and start working the dough, and they link up to form gluten — the elastic network that traps gas, gives bread its chew, and holds the whole thing together.

More protein means more gluten potential. Less protein means a softer, more tender crumb. That's the entire decision tree.

Here's how common flours break down:

• Bread flour (12–14% protein) — the workhorse for most bread baking. Strong gluten development, good chew, holds structure well. This is what we use for most of our loaves here at the bakery.

• High-gluten flour (14–15% protein) — the next level up. Used for bagels, artisan hearth breads, and anything that needs serious structure and chew. When bread flour isn't strong enough, this is what you reach for.

• 00 flour (11–13% protein, varies) — Italian-milled flour ground extremely fine. The "00" refers to the grind, not the protein content. It produces a smooth, extensible dough that stretches without snapping back. This is the pizza and pasta flour. If you're making pizza at home and using all-purpose, stop. 00 is the answer. Same goes for fresh pasta — the fine grind gives you that silky, smooth sheet that stretches, rolls and cuts like a dream.

• All-purpose flour (10–12% protein) — exactly what it says: all purpose. Good for cookies, cakes, quick breads, and some enriched breads. But it's a compromise — not strong enough for most artisan breads on its own. For bread baking, AP almost always needs to be blended with a higher-gluten flour to get the structure you need. And despite what you'll read online, it is not a good choice for pizza dough or flatbreads. It makes both of them tough and bland.

• Whole wheat flour (13–14% protein) — high protein on paper, but the bran changes everything. Those sharp bran particles physically cut through gluten strands as you mix, producing a denser crumb. Whole wheat also absorbs significantly more water than white flour because the bran soaks it up like a sponge — so your hydration has to go up to compensate. Does that mean you settle for a heavy, dense loaf? No. You adjust the formula and the process to get the crumb and texture you want. Different approach, not lower expectations.

• Cake flour (7–9% protein) — not for bread. Period. This is engineered for tenderness. If you put this in a bread recipe, you'll get a sad, flat thing that no one wants to eat.
  

One important note: the protein percentage on the nutrition label is total protein — it includes the gluten-forming proteins (glutenin and gliadin) plus other wheat proteins like albumins and globulins that don't form gluten at all. So it's a reliable indicator of gluten potential, but it's not a direct gluten measurement. That said, in refined wheat flours, the gluten-forming proteins are the majority, so the number on the bag is still the best quick reference you've got. Read it. Use it.

The Takeaway

Flour isn't just an ingredient — it's the foundation. Every decision you make after this one is either working with the flour you chose or fighting against it. Know the protein content. Know what each type does. Pick the right one for the job. Trust me, you'll save yourself headache and heartache!

Next week, we'll get into what happens when flour meets water: gluten. How it forms, how you control it, and why a hockey puck biscuit and a perfect baguette start with the exact same ingredient but end up in completely different places.

Welcome to the bread series.

— Chef Keegan