Kitchen

[SXMGirl]

I take baking classes and they all use King Arthur, so that is what I use. 

[Flashgordon22]

I buy White Lilly which I have to make a special trip to Wegmans for.  Our local markets here in Philly do not sell it. This flour makes an awesome cake!

[SharkE]

probably more like cake flour like Swanson (whatever U call it)

real 'fine' like

[loriqvc]

I wholeheartedly agree with @Sooner's detailed post and will simply add that if your recipe calls for bread flour, I recommend buying a quality brand like King Arthur's. For my other baking needs, I haven't noticed a ton of difference between the store brand all-purpose flour and the name brands.

[gardenman]

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@Sooner wrote:

@aroc3435  The key to biscuits is don't overwork them, they will get tough, don't use out of date baking powder or baking soda, and if they are rolled, try to gently layer the dough and make them rise better.

Once you get the hang of it they are SOOOOO easy to throw together.  Some recipes basically use cream instead of butter or veg shortening, and those are easy easy!  

Good luck! 

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I saw an interesting biscuit recipe on Pinterest where they treated the biscuit dough like a puff pastry dough with multiple folds to get it super flaky. I'm going to give that technique a try the next time I make biscuits. My normal biscuit recipe makes darn good biscuits, but I've never intentionally folded the biscuit dough in that manner.

In general, I find flour to be flour as long as you're using the right kind of flour. Cake flour, bread flour, all purpose flour, and self-rising flour all tend to perform equally for me across brands. I've never used the White Lily flour, but most self-rising flours are pretty soft flour and will yield good results in biscuits. A wetter dough yields a more tender biscuit. I generally find all bread flours to yield similar results, but I don't bake five identical recipes each using a different flour for comparision side by side. If I did maybe I'd see a difference. Some of the loony fringe bread baking crowd insist they can taste differences, but they also claim they can taste differences in sea salt from one brand to another in bread. When it comes to buying flour, I try to buy that with the farthest out expiration date figuring it was the most recently milled and therefore the freshest.

[ValuSkr]

Interesting discussion!  I don't bake much, and certainly not breads, and hadn't heard of White Lily flour.  This morning an article came across my feed that discusses biscuits, flour, and White Lily.   Several of you are spot-on with your explanation of "soft" flours and gluten.  Thank you!

https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2018/11/better-biscuits-south-thanksgiving/576526/

[SurferWife]

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@Sooner wrote:

@aroc3435  If you like biscuits, go online or to youtube and learn how.  If you make them from White Lily you will be the happiest person on the planet!  Just don't overwork them and you'll be happy!

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Indeed @Sooner!  Adluh is a close second. 😁

[Sooner]

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@gardenman wrote:

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@Sooner wrote:

@aroc3435  The key to biscuits is don't overwork them, they will get tough, don't use out of date baking powder or baking soda, and if they are rolled, try to gently layer the dough and make them rise better.

Once you get the hang of it they are SOOOOO easy to throw together.  Some recipes basically use cream instead of butter or veg shortening, and those are easy easy!  

Good luck! 

---

I saw an interesting biscuit recipe on Pinterest where they treated the biscuit dough like a puff pastry dough with multiple folds to get it super flaky. I'm going to give that technique a try the next time I make biscuits. My normal biscuit recipe makes darn good biscuits, but I've never intentionally folded the biscuit dough in that manner.

In general, I find flour to be flour as long as you're using the right kind of flour. Cake flour, bread flour, all purpose flour, and self-rising flour all tend to perform equally for me across brands. I've never used the White Lily flour, but most self-rising flours are pretty soft flour and will yield good results in biscuits. A wetter dough yields a more tender biscuit. I generally find all bread flours to yield similar results, but I don't bake five identical recipes each using a different flour for comparision side by side. If I did maybe I'd see a difference. Some of the loony fringe bread baking crowd insist they can taste differences, but they also claim they can taste differences in sea salt from one brand to another in bread. When it comes to buying flour, I try to buy that with the farthest out expiration date figuring it was the most recently milled and therefore the freshest.

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@gardenman  Count me in as the loony fringe bread baking crowd because White Lily does have a lighter more neutral taste than does the grocery store brand all pupose flours.  They taste nuttier and more toasted in addition to having a different texture.

And King Arthur bread flour bakes differently than store brand bread flours too.  To approximate store bread flour, you need to take out close to one tablespoon of KAF in each cup and add cake flour back. 

[shortbreadlover]

lily white is a soft wheat flour and makes the most tender bisquits ever.  but it is hard to find.  

i like to try all kinds of flour.  for really good bread, use a hard wheat or bread flour.  it has more protien in it and that makes the bread crusty

[AuntMame]

Interesting discussion! I really appreciate everyone's tips and opinions! My southern grandma always told me to use nothing except unbleached flour and that's what I do. But now I'm going to try King Arthur and look for Lilly. 

I like to use Caputo's 00 flour for pizza crusts mixed together with unbleached flour. Caputo's is an extremely fine flour that's almost the consistency of dusting powder. Have to go to an Italian grocery to buy it. It's sold on Amazon but not in the original packaging. Caputo's in Italy sells it only in bulk in like 40 pound bags destined for pizzarias. I trust Italian grocers to sell it fresh in smaller bags. I don't trust Amazon and all their anonymous sellers and their flaky warehouse system. Some reviewers claim they are not getting Caputo's when they buy unmarked plastic bags of it from Amazon.

I also like to bake bread with semolini flour. The only brand I can find around here is Bob's Red Mill.