Is wheat flower same as all purpose flower and is whole wheat flower different?

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   liesbeth345posted 12 years ago

   Is wheat flower same as all purpose flower and is whole wheat flower different?
   
   Hi John, I read this question somewhere allready but being new on this site I just can't seem to find the topic back.....Living in THailand, but baking a lot from a Dutch website I have some trouble with translation of flower ingredients. Here they sell big 22 kgs bags of Wheat flower....is that same as all purpose? and is Whole Wheat different from wheat flower. As you might now, ther eis no information on the bags....Thank you for answering my question, and for posting that great article 4 years ago!

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   HSanAlimposted 12 years ago

   I do not know the answer to your question but I can tell you that the word is spelled flour instead of flower.

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   wychicposted 12 years ago

   All-purpose flour is, essentially, wheat flour with all the good stuff taken out . In other words, they've removed the germ and anything else that is even remotely course, and it leaves a very fine flour that is usually bleached very white (thus the other name for it, white flour). Whole wheat flour still has all of the parts of the wheat, and is much more nutritious, but also courser so it's not generally used in cakes, some cookies, and in some types of bread. If the bag is labeled just wheat flour, it's hard to say whether it's the refined wheat flour of all-purpose, or if it's whole wheat. I'm going to guess there's no good way to see the flour itself? All-purpose will be white and smooth, kind of like baking powder, and whole wheat will be light brown and a bit course. Alternatively, if the ingredients list "refined wheat" or "separated wheat", then it'd all-purpose, but if it lists "whole wheat" or lists the parts of wheat, then it'd be whole.

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   liesbeth345posted 12 years ago

   @wychic, thank you very much for your answer and explanation. It was of great help! What I actually did after reading your answer was taking a spoon of flour from the wheat flour bag and a spoon of flour from the all purpose bag....smelled them and compared the flour....the  smell is slightly different, but colour is exactly the same....and both flours are not course....so my best guess is that it's both All purpose flour....now all I need to find out are the correct dutch translations :-) but i think wheat flower is translated as tarwebloem and whole wheat will be volkoren.....many bread recipes I read need both...Now remains me the difference for hard wheat and soft wheat to find out.....Where I live all purpose is widely available.....the whole wheat not that much, but I think I can use the dark rye I guess....I'll get there some day hopefully :-) Thanks a lot again!

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