What Is Wondra Flour and How Do You Cook With It? (2024)

What is Wondra Flour?

You may have heard of this flour before or seen the blue canisters next to the all-purpose, whole-wheat, and self-rising flours in the baking aisle. So what is it exactly?

Wondra flour is wheat flour that has been pre-cooked and dried. If you think of instant oatmeal (oatmeal that's par-boiled and dried for faster cooking), Wondra is the flour equivalent. Like pastry flour, Wondra is lower in protein than all-purpose flour and comes very finely ground. Because it's so fine, it dissolves instantly in liquids — why it's also called instant flour or quick-mixing flour — and won't clump. Because Wondra is made from wheat, be sure not to confuse it for a gluten-free substitute.

How to Cook With Wondra Flour

Use Wondra flour when you want to quickly thicken a liquid as it simmers, to make incredibly tender crusts and pancakes, or give foods a light breading before frying. A few of our favorite uses for Wondra flour:

Thicken sauces and gravies:

Just like cornstarch or all-purpose flour, Wondra is great for thickening a gravy, like this Easy Turkey Gravy or a light pan sauce. The wonderful thing about Wondra is that it won't leave raw lumps in your gravy, and it doesn't need to be whisked with liquid before adding to the pot.

Coat your baking pans:

If you've ever had to grease and flour your baking pans, you've probably gotten annoyed: The all-purpose flour is either too thick in places or too thin and can give finished baking a raw flour coat. Superfine Wondra will coat your pans evenly and will dissolve into the batter as it bakes.

Fry fish or vegetables:

Tempura batters are often made with fine rice flour to give delicate fish and vegetables a golden, shatteringly crispy crust once fried. Try using Wondra instead of rice flour in Crispy Beer Batter Fish & Chips, or in place of all-purpose flour the next time you fry up shrimp or tempura-style veggies.

Make crepes:

Crepe batter usually needs to set for about 30 minutes to thicken. Instantly dissolving Wondra flour cuts that time down to 10 minutes and prevents the lumps that usually mean extra whisking. Save time by using Wondra flour to make these classic crepes.

Make a pie crust:

Low-protein flour will form less gluten than regular flour, giving you an incredibly flaky, tender crust. Try subbing three-fourths of the all-purpose flour in this Easy Homemade Pie Crust with Wondra (that last fourth of all-purpose flour will make the dough easier to roll and help the crust hold its shape).

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