What is the difference between self raising flour and cake flour

A high protein flour is important in bread dough rather than cake recipes since gluten is what allows the dough to be elastic and rise properly. Many people like to avoid bleached flour for the majority of applications since it can be associated with potential health issues.

However, the bleaching of cake flour actually has its benefits. It helps the cakes rise for longer, stay moist, keep a nice crumb, and can even inhibit browning slightly , which is great for preventing overbrowning.

Self-rising flour, on the other hand, is found both bleached and unbleached. Unlike cake flour, which can be difficult to find unbleached, you should be able to find both types of self-rising flour in your local supermarkets.

Keep in mind that this will depend on where you live. This fine mill allows the flour to create a more delicate, lighter texture than regular flour, which is great for making cakes.

Whilst cake flour is just that, flour, self-rising flour is regular flour with a few added ingredients. Make sure to incorporate this baking powder evenly into the flour first by using a sieve.

Self-raising flour can be prepared by anyone on their own by adding one and a half teaspoons of baking powder and half teaspoons of salt per cup of all-purpose flour.

Cake flour is a finely ground flour made from soft wheat, while self-raising flour is flour that has salt and baking powder added to it. The key difference between cake flour and self-raising flour is that cake flour has little protein content while self-raising flour has more protein content. The following infographic tabulates the differences between cake flour and self-raising flour for side by side comparison.

Cake flour is finely grounded and made from wheat. It has low protein and gluten levels. No additional ingredients are added to it. Cake flour is usually bleached and therefore is not sold in some countries due to health issues Eg: Australia.

Self-raising flour is not finely grounded as cake flour and has more protein and gluten content. It has additional ingredients like salt and baking powder and can be found in both bleached and unbleached varieties. We use high quality self-raising flour within all of our cakes to ensure they cook to our high standards. As well as all British ingredients, and supporting other British companies.

As for our Vegan Sponges we use the same Self raising flour as for our normal sponge cake recipes but using soya the plant based milk. Make sure when you are baking yourself at home, that you check the expiration date of the flour which you are using especially when you are using self-raising flour.

If your self-raising flour is out of date then your sponge may not rise properly! As it is know that plain flour has a generally longer self-life than self raising flour, due to the fact it does not have rising agents which expire. In certain delicate cakes like chiffon or angel food , you want soft, light texture with just enough structure: the lower protein content of cake flour helps achieve this.

You can make a cake flour substitute with a mix of all-purpose flour and cornstarch because the cornstarch helps inhibit the formation of some of the gluten in the all-purpose flour. The result? A cake that's just as tender as it would be if you used store-bought cake flour. Try not to skip that sifting step—you want the cornstarch to be thoroughly combined with the flour and the mix to be light and airy.