Flours and grains

Arborio rice

Italian cuisine

Italian rice with a large, fairly broad grain and an extensive pearly core – a classic choice for risotto.

Basmati rice

International

Aromatic long-grain rice from the Indo-Gangetic Plain whose slender grain lengthens markedly in cooking and stays separate.

Bomba rice

International

Spanish round-grain rice that soaks up a lot of stock as it cooks – one of the traditional paella rices.

Brown rice

International

Whole-grain or brown rice with only the husk removed, keeping its bran layers and germ.

Buckwheat flour

French cuisine

Flour from buckwheat, a pseudocereal of the knotweed family; naturally gluten-free, it is the flour of the Breton galette.

Carnaroli rice

Italian cuisine

Italian rice with a long, slightly tapered grain and a firm core, regarded as one of the best for risotto.

Cornmeal for polenta

Italian cuisine

Ground maize in several grinds – from coarse bramata for classic polenta to very fine fumetto for baking and coating.

Czech wheat flours: hladká, polohrubá, hrubá and krupice

Czech cuisine

A Czech peculiarity: wheat flour is graded by particle size into fine, semi-coarse and coarse, alongside fine and coarse semolina (krupice).

Farina tipo 00

Italian cuisine

Italy's whitest soft-wheat flour; the 00 refers to low ash content, not to the flour's strength.

Flour strength and Manitoba flour

Flour strength, measured as the W index on the Chopin alveograph, shows how well a dough holds gas; Manitoba is a trade name for very strong flour.

Flour types: what the number on the bag means

A flour's type number expresses its ash, i.e. mineral, content – and the countries that use it define it differently.

Glutinous rice

International

Rice with an opaque white grain and almost no amylose that clumps together when steamed; despite the name it contains no gluten.

Jasmine rice

International

Thai fragrant long-grain Hom Mali rice with a low amylose content, soft when cooked.

Parboiled rice

International

Rice that is soaked, steamed and dried while still in its husk and only then milled; it cooks up separate and does not turn mushy.

Rye flour

Czech cuisine

Flour milled from rye – light, dark bread flour or wholemeal; without souring it will not make a good loaf.

Semola rimacinata di grano duro

Italian cuisine

Re-milled durum wheat semolina that Italian law reserves for bread-making and retail sale; the basis of Altamura bread.

Spelt flour

Flour from spelt, a hulled wheat with weaker, more extensible gluten – good for bread, rolls, pasta and crackers.

Sushi rice

International

Short-grain non-glutinous japonica rice that holds together when cooked; the best-known variety is Koshihikari.

Vialone Nano rice

Italian cuisine

Italian japonica rice with a shorter, rounded pearly grain; from defined municipalities of the province of Verona it is also sold as Riso Nano Vialone Veronese PGI.

Wholemeal flour

Flour from the whole grain including bran and germ – darker and richer in fibre and minerals, but with a shorter shelf life than white flour.