Are you a scoop-and-tap, spoon-and-level or pack-and-scrape cook? There are many ways that cooks measure flour, but they don’t provide equivalent results. A cup of flour measured by one method doesn’t always equal a cup measured another way. If you’re following a recipe, it’s helpful to know how the author measures. In the introductory chapter of many cookbooks, the author describes the flour-measuring method used for the book’s recipes.

In the Cooking Pleasures test kitchen, we use the spoon-and-level technique for all recipes that appear in the magazine. We recommend you do the same. Stir the flour in the bag or container, and spoon it into a measuring cup. Then level it with the straight edge of a table knife.