Sixth Grade
Worksheets
How Does Baking Work?
Whether you are baking a loaf of bread, a three-layer cake, a pan of muffins, or some strawberry Danish, you will most likely use wheat flour for your main ingredient. If you are using a prepackaged mix, the flour is in there. If you are baking from scratch, you will carefully measure out the flour using a measuring cup.
Certain types of wheat, known as hard wheat, are used for bread and pastries that use yeast to make them rise. Soft wheat is used for baking items that use baking powder such as cakes and muffins.
Wheat has three main components - starch, protein, and moisture. About seventy percent of a kernel of wheat is starch. The proteins in wheat include gluten and gliadin. The moisture content of wheat is about ten to fifteen percent.
To bake bread, you will first mix warm water and a small amount of yeast. Yeast is a single-cell fungus that eats sugars and releases carbon dioxide. Next, you will add the wheat flour and other ingredients like salt and oil and begin to knead the bread dough. This process forms strands of gluten from the proteins in the flour. The yeast adds in bubbles of carbon dioxide that will allow the bread to rise. The gluten holds it all together.
You must let the bread dough sit for two to three hours in a warm place to give it time to rise. Then it will be ready to bake in your oven.
