ALSO, the difference btwn these flours??
They’re both described as “Soft Wheat Tipo 00” at bottom of pkgs, but RED for long-fermenting and BLUE for All Purpose. How are the flours actually different?
Bit of a contradiction on the red packet. Front says “Soft Wheat Flour” but side says “Flour with Strong Elastic Gluten”.
Think we might need to see the other side of both packets which should have the nutrition label.
Abe, thanks for considering this; I just posted addtl image showing the NF stats.
There’s not much difference between them.
Blue packet has 12% protein and Red packet has 13.3% protein. Both described as soft flour but red is also described as Strong Elastic Gluten.
The only thing I can say is that perhaps the protein % is not gluten %. It might still be a soft four as not all protein in flour is gluten. But that still doesn’t answer the contradiction on the red packet.
Bit of a puzzle.
With nothing else to go on the red packet does advise it’s suitable for long fermentations. So i’d guess it’d suit a recipe that calls just for that.
P.s. I am going to forward your question onto a friend of mine who’s very knowledgeable in bread baking and Italian flours/bread to-boot.
Thank you very much, Abe! I somehow used the last of my standard AP flour and didn’t have a spare pkg…first time this has happened in my many decades of baking! I plan on replenishing later this week, but in the meantime, I had the cookie-baking urge and thought if this Caputo Classico AP flour might work, then I’d give it go…but I’d rather not waste if it’s not recommended.
Btw, I have use both Caputo flours for making HM pasta and all turned out great!
Well if you still wish to make cookies then out of the two of them go for the blue packet. It has less protein than the red packet. Cookies are enriched which further weakens gluten and if you’re careful to not overwork the dough then there will be minimal gluten formation. Don’t knead the dough anymore than it needs. Just enough to bring it together. I think it’ll work.
If you want a long fermented recipe for the red packet then I can recommend one.
Answer from my friend. Hope I word this correctly…
Hard wheat is ‘Durum’ (Duro = Hard from which Durum is derived) and everything else is soft. It’s not referring to the gluten content but rather the physical properties of the wheat and Italian terminology.
So hard and soft wheat refers to the wheat ‘variety’ but doesn’t imply if it’s strong or weak gluten.
Your packets of Italian flour are basically saying they aren’t durum wheat. The blue packet has less gluten than the red. I would think the blue packet is closer to what you’ll be familiar with as AP flour and the red packet would be bread flour.
Thanks very much for your efforts!
My pleasure. Enjoy the cookies 
Thanks again for your input; very much appreciate the support!
Thank you! I learned something new today because of your question. Terminology can be confusing when it’s not standardised.
Another contradictions … the nutrition label on the red bag indicates the serving size for determining nutrition is 30g. It also indicates there are 166 servings in the bag … 30x166=4980g of flour in a bag labeled as 1000g.
That’s a very good point @Otis. Well we’ve solved one contradiction which turned out to not be a contradiction after all. Soft and hard wheat in Italy does not refer to the gluten percentage. But another one crops up. Well spotted.
EDIT: Solved the mystery. Not 166 servings but 16.6! 30 x 16.6 = 498g. You have found a typo. It’s amazing what a decimal point, or lack thereof, can do.
Except 498g will only fill 1/2 of the 1kg bag. I think they copied the nutri label from a 5kg bag and stuck onto the 1kg bag without adjusting the “servings” per bag.
Oops… don’t know why I was thinking of a 500g bag. I think you’re right. They did say “container”!
I do believe both of those flours are available in 500g bags.
I like math, but I do not understand Caputo’s “funny” math calculations
2.2lb bag = 1kg = 1000g divided by 30g/serv = 33.33 servings, so idk how the “166” or “16.6” comes in, unless as you mentioned, it’s just an incorrect number or misprint.
I did not make cookies tonight after all; maybe tomorrow or Wednesday, but I’ll update with results after the experiment. And rather than making a new NYT cookie recipe, I’m leaning toward making typical oatmeal cookies since I know that dough and how it behaves…easier to adjust if needed.
In my haste, and the fact it was the early hours of the morning, I forgot it was a 1kg and thought it was a 500g bag of flour. When I saw that 30 x 16.6 was 498g I thought it was a typo. But of you have 5 packets of 1kg flour in one “container” then it makes sense they might have taken the label from there and forgotten to recalculate the amount of servings.
Got it! Phew, I feel better now!
5000g •/• 30g Serv = 166.66 Servings
166.66 Serv •/• 5Pkgs = 33.33 Serv /1kg Pkg
•/• = divided by
