Plain Flour

Plain flour is made from soft wheat, making it low in gluten and therefore suitable for most types of baking, other than yeast baking. Containing 10% protein, it gives baked items a light, short texture, and is particularly good for fruit cakes, biscuits and shortcrust pastry. It may also be used as a thickener for sauces, for coating raw fish and meat before frying and will prevent rolled-out pastry from sticking to the work surface or rolling pin.

Plain flour is very similar to US all-purpose flour, although the US flour has slightly more gluten (10-13%), making it more suitable (although not perfect) for yeast baking. Canadian all-purpose flour is even higher in gluten, and is not recommended as a direct substitute for plain flour.