Pizelles - Cake Flour?

"Dan Wenz" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

I'm the family pizelle maker once again, and want a crisper pizelle vs.
past attempts, so got a few recipes from the Web. Beside those, I have
some never used cake flour, and wonder whether any of you folks have used
cake flour instead of regular flour for pizelles. Comments, anyone?

Don't know about cake flour. This makes a crispy pizzelle
Pizzelles

Ingredients:

6 eggs at room temperature

1 1/3 cups sugar

1/2 lb margarine, softened

4 cups flour

1 T baking powder

3 T vanilla or 2 T anise

Beat eggs, adding sugar gradually. Beat until smooth.

Add melted margarine and vanilla. Sift flour and baking powder together and
add to the egg mixture.

Mix until smooth batter is sticky but loose enough to be dropped by spoon.

Makes 80 to 100

Optional: Crush anise seed with mortar and pestal and add to
mixture.

Add cocoa mix to make a chocolate version

This is a favorite for holidays and special occasions.

On Sat, 01 Oct 2005 10:24:55 -0400, Dan Wenz <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

I'm the family pizelle maker once again, and want a crisper pizelle vs.
past attempts, so got a few recipes from the Web. Beside those, I have
some never used cake flour, and wonder whether any of you folks have
used cake flour instead of regular flour for pizelles. Comments, anyone?

for crispy you need more fat, thinner dough (like a thick batter), and
less dough (for a thinner cookie). I don't know whether this helps
with crispinees, but many recipes call for letting the batter sit for
a while (eg. overnight) for the flavors to blend.

Sue(tm)
Lead me not into temptation... I can find it myself!

Hi Dan, I'm new to this group, but I am a professional chef with over
23 years experience. But, unfortunately not a whole lot of
Baking/pastry experience. What experience I do have is at your
disposal..I hope I can help you. Cake flour is made from soft wheat,
while bread flour is made from hard winter wheat. The difference
between the two is gluten. A protein that gives bread the strength to
rise. Cake flour would tend to make things more soft like a cake is
more soft than bread. I would try the pizelles with bread flour, and
try to adjust the fat. You might substitute oil or butter for the
margarine mentioned in one of these posts, because margarine contains
water, which would detract from the crispyness. Also check the temp at
which you are cooking and the thickness of the batter. A more thin
batter and/or a higher temp should result in a crispier pizelle. Hope
this helps.

ChefCarol said:

Hi Dan, I'm new to this group, but I am a professional chef with over
23 years experience.

etc.

Thanks! I'm aware of the variation among the various wheats, and had
already used high gluten flour for baking bread and regular flour for
pizzelles in the past. They were, generally not as crisp as we felt they
they might be, so I was curious as to what a low gluten flour might do
for us. That type of flour is not widely sold in the supermarkets in my
area (Near Baltimore, MD), but I located a small box of it and so tried
some. An overnight rest in the open should tell the story, but the
pizzelles seemed to be OK, crispy without being burnt. Humidity is low
now, finally, fortunately. We'll see tomorrow.

There are, literally hundreds (Thousands?) of pizzelle recipes out there
- confusing to say the least, and time is passing, so I'd rather not
have to reinvent the wheel. Based on a Google search, I've learned that
they should: 1. Not be kept in a tightly closed container, and,
2. They should be kept in a tightly closed container!
I'm opting for a loosely closed container to keep critters out. I'm
still curious as to what the various ingredients folks put into the
pizzelles do for them - the recipes vary in ratios of ingredients, types
of fats used (oil, butter, margarine,) etc.. I'm curious as to what can
be reduced without harming the "cookie", for calorie reduction. So much
to do, so little time. Wish I were 70 again :-)

Edwin Pawlowski said:

Don't know about cake flour. This makes a crispy pizzelle
Pizzelles

Etc.

Thanks, I'd already started making some with some cake flour I'd finally
bought at a local store. I'll hold on to the recipe for future perusal.

Curly Sue said:

for crispy you need more fat, thinner dough (like a thick batter), and
less dough (for a thinner cookie). I don't know whether this helps
with crispinees, but many recipes call for letting the batter sit for
a while (eg. overnight) for the flavors to blend.

Thanks - I was short of time today, so the batter was only in the
refrigerator for around two hours. Cookies were pretty crisp with the
cake flour, we'll see how they fare overnight in the finally low
humidity we're having.

"Dan Wenz" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

Quoted message said:

Based on a Google search, I've learned that they should: 1. Not be kept
in a tightly closed container, and,
2. They should be kept in a tightly closed container!

Yes, they are both correct. They lose the crispness in a tight plastic
container, but will maintain it in a tight metal can with soem air space.
Usually we wrap them in foil. They also freeze well.

Quoted message said:

I'm curious as to what can be reduced without harming the "cookie", for
calorie reduction. So much to do, so little time. Wish I were 70 again :-)

Splenda sucks. Keep the sugar.
--
Ed
http://pages.cthome.net/edhome/

"Edwin Pawlowski" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

"Dan Wenz" <[email hidden]> wrote in message

Quoted message said:

Based on a Google search, I've learned that they should: 1. Not be kept
in a tightly closed container, and,
2. They should be kept in a tightly closed container!

Yes, they are both correct. They lose the crispness in a tight plastic
container, but will maintain it in a tight metal can with soem air space.
Usually we wrap them in foil. They also freeze well.

Quoted message said:

I'm curious as to what can be reduced without harming the "cookie", for
calorie reduction. So much to do, so little time. Wish I were 70 again
:-)

Splenda sucks. Keep the sugar.
--
Ed
http://pages.cthome.net/edhome/

Yes, Yes, Yes - splenda sucks, sucks, sucks.
What is this stuff anyway -- yes, I've looked it up.
Dee Dee

Edwin Pawlowski said:

Yes, they are both correct. They lose the crispness in a tight plastic
container, but will maintain it in a tight metal can with soem air space.
Usually we wrap them in foil. They also freeze well.

Thanks - the wife packed them in a metal container, pretty tight,
some airspace.

Quoted message said:

Splenda sucks. Keep the sugar.

I had already used half Splenda and half sugar.

Dee Randall said:

Yes, Yes, Yes - splenda sucks, sucks, sucks.
What is this stuff anyway -- yes, I've looked it up.

Splenda's less than ingenuous ads note that "It's made from sugar so it
tastes like sugar" - you know, salt is made from sodium and chlorine, so
it must taste like sodium (VERY reactive - just dump a piece into
water!) and also like chlorine (Gas used to kill folks in WWI, also
kills bugs in our water). Example of a non sequitur (I think)!

ChefCarol said:

Hi Dan, I'm new to this group, but I am a professional chef with over
23 years experience. But, unfortunately not a whole lot of
Baking/pastry experience. What experience I do have is at your
disposal..I hope I can help you. Cake flour is made from soft wheat,
while bread flour is made from hard winter wheat. The difference
between the two is gluten. A protein that gives bread the strength to
rise. Cake flour would tend to make things more soft like a cake is

You can make cake flour from any kind of wheat.
You can make bread flour from any kind of wheat.
The distinction occurs during the flour-milling
process, when heavy protein-rich particles from
outer portions of the wheat berry are separated
from the lighter starch-rich particles from the
interior. Cake flour is made from the lighter
fractions, bread flour is a balanced mix, and
semolina is made from the heavy fractions.

In the U.S., some flours are manufactured from
a single type of wheat. However, most flour
milling operations must be able to adapt to
wheats from various sources to produce the
distribution of products demanded by their
customers. Any products can be produced from
any wheat, but certain wheats will be higher
in protein or in starch, so will produce a
greater yield of semolina, etc.

On Sat, 01 Oct 2005 16:38:09 GMT, [email hidden] (Curly
Sue) connected the dots and wrote:

~On Sat, 01 Oct 2005 10:24:55 -0400, Dan Wenz <[email hidden]>
~wrote:
~
~>I'm the family pizelle maker once again, and want a crisper pizelle
vs.
~>past attempts, so got a few recipes from the Web. Beside those, I
have
~>some never used cake flour, and wonder whether any of you folks have
~>used cake flour instead of regular flour for pizelles. Comments,
anyone?
~
~for crispy you need more fat, thinner dough (like a thick batter),
and
~less dough (for a thinner cookie). I don't know whether this helps
~with crispinees, but many recipes call for letting the batter sit for
~a while (eg. overnight) for the flavors to blend.
~
~Sue(tm)
~Lead me not into temptation... I can find it myself!

Letting the batter rest is usually to keep the gluten from forming and
making the finished product tough. Also, IIRC, to allow the starch to
"bloom"<?>.

With cake flour, there's less gluten, so less toughness to worry
about.

maxine in ri