Flour, Protein & Country
Protein on the Bag vs Actual Gluten
Let’s start with the deceptively simple question:
“Is the protein on the package the actual gluten protein?”
No. The protein number on the bag is total protein, not “grams of gluten.”
Here’s what happens behind the scenes in a mill:
A small flour sample is analyzed for nitrogen content.
The nitrogen value is multiplied by a conversion factor (often 5.7 or 6.25).
The result is labeled as “protein %” on the bag.
That calculation includes: Gluten-forming proteins (gliadin and glutenin) and other wheat proteins that never become gluten (albumins, globulins, enzymes, etc.)
In refined wheat flour, the majority of the protein is gluten-forming, which is why bakers still use protein % as a shorthand for “strength,” but it’s an approximation, not a direct gluten reading.
Actual gluten only exists once: The flour is hydrated, and the dough is worked (mixing, kneading, folding), giving those proteins a chance to link together.
Two different 12% flours can behave completely differently. Wheat variety, growing conditions, ash content, and milling style can change how easily those proteins hydrate, align, and crosslink. Protein % tells you the potential, while dough behavior (rheology) is the reality.
Why Protein Varies Between Countries
Flour isn’t a neutral white powder; it’s an agricultural product, and it reflects the grain and the culture around it.
A few key reasons flours differ so much across borders:
Wheat species and hardness
North America grows a lot of hard wheats (higher protein). Parts of Europe rely more on softer wheats (lower protein), especially for pastry traditions.Climate and region
Weather, soil, and farming practices affect protein development in the endosperm. Drier climates often produce harder wheats.Milling and blending practices
Mills blend different lots of wheat to hit a target spec. A mill making “strong bread flour” will blend for higher protein and stronger gluten quality; a mill making “cake flour” will do the opposite.Local baking culture
A country built around crusty bread and chewy rolls will tend to favor stronger flours. A culture with a huge cake/pastry tradition may keep softer flours as the default.
This is why a Canadian “all-purpose” can behave like an American bread flour, and why a UK “plain flour” can feel closer to a US pastry flour.
Typical Protein Ranges by Region & Label
These are typical ranges, not hard rules. Always read your own bag’s nutrition panel.
United States
Cake flour: ~7–8%
Pastry flour: ~8–9%
All-purpose flour: ~10–11.7%
Bread flour: ~11.5–13.5%
High-gluten / “strong bread” flour: ~13.5–14.5%+
Most American recipes that simply say “all-purpose flour” are written for something around 10.5–11.7%. Bread flour recipes usually expect mid-12% protein.
Canada
Canadian flour is often milled from very hard wheats and blends tend to run high.
Commonly:
All-purpose flour: ~12–13%
Bread flour: ~13–14.5%+
So a Canadian baker experiemcing AP at 13% and bread flour at 14.5% is not unusual. That AP is essentially in US bread flour territory. If they follow a US AP-based recipe without adjustments, their dough will usually feel stiffer, drier, and more elastic at the same hydration.
United Kingdom & Ireland
Plain flour: about 9–10.5%
Strong / bread flour: about 11.5–13%
Self-raising flour: based on plain flour (~9–10% protein) plus leavening
Here, “plain flour” is softer than many North American AP flours and behaves more like a lower-protein AP or even pastry flour. “Strong flour” is closer to a US bread flour.
Continental Europe – French T-Types
In many European countries, flour is labeled by ash content (T-numbers) rather than by “AP/bread/pastry.” Protein varies by mill, but there are broad tendencies:
T45: very white, low ash; used for pastry, fine cakes, viennoiserie. Protein often sits in a soft AP/pastry range.
T55: standard baguette flour in many places; medium ash and moderate protein. Can behave like a versatile AP/bread flour.
T65, T80 and above: higher ash, often more rustic breads; may be slightly stronger and more absorbent.
The T-number itself is not a protein rating. Two different T55 flours can have different protein levels; ash is about mineral content, not strength. You still need to look at the protein line.
Italy – 00, 0, 1, etc.
Italian classification (00, 0, 1, 2) mainly describes refinement and extraction (how much of the outer grain is removed) and fineness of grind.
Protein is independent of the “00” label:
A “00 pizza” flour might be ~12–13% and act like a strong AP/bread flour.
A “00 pastry” flour may be ~9–10% and behave like a soft AP/pastry flour.
Italian bakers choose 00 for its silkiness and performance in certain doughs, not because 00 automatically means “high” or “low” protein.
Again: the front says 00; the back tells you the protein.
Australia & New Zealand
Plain flour: often around 10–11%
Baker’s/bread flour: higher, similar to US bread flours
Cake/sponge flours: lower
There’s considerable brand variation, so the same “read the back of the bag” rule applies.
High vs Medium vs Low Protein
Once you have the protein number, it helps to think of flour in three bands.
High-protein flour (roughly 12.5–14.5%+)
Behaves like a strong bread flour:
Absorbs more water, so dough feels drier and tighter at the same hydration.
Builds a strong, elastic gluten network quickly.
Supports high gas retention and lots of structure.
Ideal for:
Bagels, chewy pizza, rustic loaves that need serious strength.
Lean breads where chewiness is desirable.
Potential issues if you don’t manage it:
Tough or rubbery crumb from over-kneading.
Dense or dry results if hydration is too low.
Bready, chewy texture in recipes that were meant to be tender and fluffy (e.g. some enriched rolls) if flour strength isn’t tamed.
Medium-protein flour (roughly 10.5–12%)
This is the “all-rounder” zone:
Enough gluten potential for bread and rolls.
Still soft enough to handle cookies, muffins, simple cakes with correct technique.
With proper hydration and handling, it can lean either way: chewier and more bread-like, or softer and more pastry-like.
Low-protein flour (roughly 7–9.5%)
Behaves like cake or soft pastry flour:
Lower gluten potential, lower absorption.
Naturally tender crumb; less elasticity.
Best suited for:
Cakes, cupcakes, genoise, sponges.
Shortbreads, sablés, delicate cookies.
Pie crusts and some laminated doughs where tenderness is prioritized over chew.
In bread formulas, it can give:
Slack, sticky doughs at the same hydration that medium or high-protein flour handles easily.
Flatter, more fragile loaves if gluten structure isn’t supported with technique or added gluten.
Dough Rheology: Technique Matters as Much as the Number
The term rheology simply describes how dough behaves when you push, pull, or stretch it—how it flows, resists, tears, or relaxes.
Two flours with identical protein percentages can behave very differently because:
The ratio of gliadin to glutenin changes the balance between extensibility and elasticity.
Ash content and enzymatic activity alter fermentation and browning.
Milling fineness affects water absorption and dough smoothness.
And then, on top of the flour itself, every baker adds their own set of moving parts. One person runs the mixer hard and fast; another barely mixes at all and lets time and gentle folds do the work. Some formulas rely on long, cool fermentation and autolyse to build strength quietly; others use warmer dough temperatures and more direct mixing. Plenty of bakers lean on pre-gelatinized flour methods like tangzhong or yudane to build softness, while others deliberately insulate flour with fat—through creaming, rubbing in, or techniques like fraisage—to keep gluten in check. When you zoom out and look at everything together, it becomes obvious: you can coax a high-protein flour into acting soft and plush, or push a mild flour into carrying more structure, simply by the way you hydrate, mix, rest, and handle the dough.
Dough temperature (cool dough vs warm dough changes how quickly gluten develops and how elastic it feels).
Autolyse length (no autolyse vs 20–60 minutes of flour + water alone).
Fermentation schedule (short, warm bulk vs long, cold retard).
Salt timing (adding salt early vs after an autolyse; salt tightens and strengthens gluten).
Preferments (poolish, biga, levain percentages change flavor, strength, and extensibility).
Folding frequency (many gentle folds vs one big knead).
Enrichment level (how much fat/sugar/egg is in the dough—and when it’s added).
Acidity / pH (sourdough, buttermilk, yogurt, etc., slightly change how gluten behaves).
Oxidation level (very intense mixing introduces more oxygen, which can strengthen dough up to a point).
Shaping style (tight preshapes/tension vs loose shaping affects how the gluten network is organized).
Change any of those knobs—dough temperature, autolyse time, how long and how often you fold, how acidic the dough is, how enriched it is—and the same bag of flour will give you a completely different result. That’s why two bakers using identical flour can end up with bread that looks and eats nothing alike.
Working With Stronger Flour Than the Recipe Expects
Many bakers ( some using high-gluten specialty flours elsewhere) end up in this situation: their “all-purpose” is 12–13% protein and their bread flour is 13–14.5%+. Recipes they’re following were built around 10.5–11.5% AP.
Typical symptoms:
Dough that feels stiff and resistant when it should be soft and relaxed.
More snap-back during shaping.
Finished crumb that’s tighter and chewier than advertised.
Cookies and pastries leaning dry or bready.
There are several legitimate ways to bring that flour back into line.
Blend with a softer flour
You can blend down a strong flour using:
Cake flour
Pastry/plain flour
In some cases, a small portion of starch (cornstarch, potato starch) for cookies and tender pastries
For enriched breads and soft rolls, replacing 10–25% of a very strong flour with a lower-protein flour often moves the texture closer to what the recipe intended.
For delicate cookies or shortbread, you might take that further—25–40% softer flour blended into a strong one can dramatically change bite.
Adjust hydration upward
High-protein flours can simply absorb more water. If you copy a hydration that worked for a softer flour, your dough may behave like under-hydrated bread dough: tough and tight.
A controlled way to adjust:
Start with the recipe’s suggested hydration, but hold back a small portion of the liquid if you’re unsure.
Mix the dough and assess. If the dough is clearly stiff, dry, or struggling to come together, gradually add more liquid while mixing.
In many cases, adding 1–3% extra liquid (10–30 g per 1000 g flour) is enough. For very strong flours or doughs heavy with enrichments, you may end up adjusting a bit more, guided by feel rather than a fixed percentage.
Control gluten through fat and mixing method
Strong flour does not always need aggressive kneading.
Some classic professional techniques that are especially useful with strong flour:
Reverse creaming / coating flour in fat: blending fat into the flour before adding liquid coats some particles and limits gluten formation. This is common in cakes, some enriched doughs, and many pastry formulas when tenderness is desired.
Fraisage: smearing dough on the bench with the heel of your hand in short strokes. It aligns fat streaks and distributes moisture while avoiding a tight, over-worked gluten network. Many pastry chefs use this in pâte brisée and sablé.
Short mixing + folds: rather than 15 minutes of continuous kneading, a shorter initial mix followed by periodic stretch-and-folds can develop structure more gently, which is useful when flour is very strong.
Bring in low- or no-gluten components
In some dough styles, particularly those that should eat like pastry rather than bread, bakers deliberately replace part of the flour with non-gluten components such as:
Almond flour
Corn or potato starch
Finely milled oats
Replacing 5–15% of the wheat flour with one of these can soften the structure, reduce chew, and create a more tender bite while still allowing the dough to hold together.
Working With Softer Flour Than the Recipe Expects
The opposite situation shows up frequently in the UK and parts of Europe: a recipe was written for a robust American AP or bread flour, and the baker only has 9–10% plain flour or a relatively soft T45.
Common signs:
Dough feels looser and stickier at the recommended hydration.
It’s difficult to build surface tension while shaping.
Loaves spread more than they rise.
Enriched doughs cannot carry heavy fillings without collapsing.
There are well-established strategies for this as well.
Strengthen with bread flour or vital wheat gluten
If both plain and “strong” flours are available:
Blend them. For bread, replacing 25–50% of plain flour with strong flour is common in practice.
If strong flour is not available but vital wheat gluten is, it can be added directly:
Typical starting range: 0.5–2% of total flour weight.
For 500 g of flour, that’s 2.5–10 g of vital wheat gluten.
Mix it thoroughly into the dry flour before hydrating.
This can move a plain flour closer to a medium or higher-strength bread flour in behavior.
Reduce hydration slightly
Softer flours reach saturation earlier. If you pour in the amount of water that worked well for a firmer American AP, a weaker flour may behave like batter.
It’s reasonable to:
Hold back 2–5% of the water or other liquids initially.
Add more only if the dough feels too stiff, always using the dough’s feel as the reference rather than a number alone.
The goal is the same visual and tactile cues—smooth, elastic, slightly tacky—not matching someone else’s hydration percentage.
Give gluten more time and development
Low-protein flour can still produce good bread if gluten is given help:
A more thorough initial knead or more stretch-and-folds during bulk fermentation.
A slightly longer bulk ferment to allow structure to organize.
Timing still depends on temperature and yeast quantity, but the key idea is that weaker flour often needs more patient development, not less.
Be mindful of heavy enrichments
If a flour begins at 9–10% protein and the dough recipe includes: High sugar, a lot of fat, multiple eggs, and dairy,
all of these are gluten-tenderizing. When using softer flour in such formulas, bakers sometimes:
Strengthen the flour (blends or gluten) and/or
Slightly reduce enrichments when first testing the recipe, then gradually increase them once they understand how their flour behaves.
Reading the Bag, Reading the Dough
At some point the conversation has to move from numbers back to dough in your hands.
A practical way to work with unfamiliar flour:
Check the protein % and place it mentally into low / medium / high.
Consider where the recipe likely sits:
Many American blog recipes using “AP flour” assume around 11%.
Many UK recipes using plain flour assume around 9–10%.
European recipes using T45/T55 or 00 need you to check the label.
Mix the dough and actually watch and feel what happens.
If it’s stiffer than the recipe describes or shows, your flour is probably stronger.
If it’s much looser and slacker, it’s probably softer.
Adjust hydration, blending, and technique the next time based on that information instead of assuming failure on your part.
Flour is variable by nature. That’s not a problem; it’s simply something to work with rather than fight.
Once you understand that the protein number is a measure of strength and potential—not a rigid destiny—you can use Canadian 13% AP, UK plain, Italian 00, French T55, or anything else available and still land on the textures you want. The label gives you the map; your hands, techniques, and adjustments are what get you the rest of the way.
Sources & Further Reading
Books
Bread Science: The Chemistry and Craft of Making Bread – Emily Buehler
A very approachable but technical book that explains what’s happening inside dough—protein content, gluten formation, flour strength, water absorption, fermentation, and testing methods for strong vs weak flours. twobluebooks.com+1A Handful of Flour – Shipton Mill
Written from the perspective of a working mill, this book walks through different flour types (including European and UK-style flours), how they’re milled, and how their characteristics affect baking. It’s practical if you’re curious about things like “strong” vs “soft” flour beyond the supermarket label. Shipton MillModernist Bread – Nathan Myhrvold & Francisco Migoya
A huge, advanced reference set, but its sections on flour testing, protein, gluten, and international flours are some of the most detailed in print. If you like lab-level charts and side-by-side comparisons, this is the rabbit hole. lindleymills.com
Articles & Blog Posts
“Protein Percentage in Flour: Why It Matters” – King Arthur Baking
Breaks down how different flours (cake, pastry, AP, bread) are milled to specific protein levels, and how those levels impact gluten strength and texture in finished bakes. Also shows how small protein changes between brands can affect results. King Arthur Baking+2King Arthur Baking+2“Determining the Protein Content in Flour” – Rouxbe
A concise guide that lists typical protein ranges by flour type (cake, pastry, AP, bread, whole wheat) and shows how to read the protein number off a nutrition label so you can compare flours across brands and countries. Rouxbe+1“All About Flour” – Foodbod Sourdough
A UK-based sourdough baker’s explanation of strong vs nutritional protein, why the number on the bag isn’t identical to “gluten %,” and how real-world dough behavior sometimes diverges from the theoretical protein number. Good perspective if you’re juggling UK flours and international recipes. The simplest way to make sourdough“Understanding Flour Types” – Weekend Bakery
A European-focused overview of flour types, including German T-numbers and how ash content and strength relate to baking style. Useful context if you’re working with T405, T550, T1050, etc., and trying to line them up with AP/bread flours from other countries. Weekend Bakery“Flour 101” – Wheat Foods Council
Industry-level but accessible primer on how different wheat classes become cake, pastry, AP, and bread flours, and how protein and starch balance shape the intended use for each type. Wheat Foods Council+1“Bread Flour vs. All-Purpose Flour” – Serious Eats
A clear comparison of AP vs bread flour, focusing on protein ranges, gluten formation, and how flour strength changes texture and hydration needs in dough. Helpful if you’re trying to decide when you can swap one for the other and what to expect when you do. Serious Eats
