A sifter is a tool used in the kitchen for breaking up food or straining liquid. You can use a sifter for baking cakes, macarons, lemon curd, raspberry mousse, making pizza sauce, and tzatziki.
What is a sifter used for
Cakes
The process of sifting adds air and lightens the ingredients.
Cakes need to have flour sifted prior to adding it to the other dry ingredients.
As a bakes in the oven, the sifted flour creates small air bubbles throughout the cake.
The cake has a bouncy feeling when you push your finger into it, instead of being dense.
You can feel and taste the difference of a cake that has had the flour sifted.
Macarons
Macarons need to have their almond flour and icing sugar sifted to create the velvety smooth macaron shells.
Almond flour and icing sugar clump up into balls over time, if you were to use these ingredients as they are, they would produce a macaron shell that is lumpy.
Sifting these clumpy ingredients will produce a smooth, round, professional looking macaron.
Pizza Sauce
When making pizza sauce, canned tomatoes need to have the liquid removed from the can.
Place the tomatoes in the sifter by pouring the whole can through the sifter. Have a bowl underneath the sifter so it can catch all of the liquid.
Leave the tomatoes to sit for 1-2 hours.
Once the liquid has been removed, you can start mashing the tomatoes in a saucepan and start creating your pizza sauce.
Tzatziki Sauce
Tzatziki sauce is made by using yogurt. Yogurt has too much liquid in it to create tzatziki sauce.
Place a large piece of cheese cloth in the sifter, and then put your yogurt in the middle.
Wrap the cheese cloth around the yogurt and tie it up.
Place a bowl underneath the sifter to catch the liquid.
Place the yogurt in the sifter with the bowl underneath in the fridge for minimum 2 hours.
Remove the yogurt from the fridge and unwrap the cheesecloth. Place the thick yogurt in a fresh bowl to make your tzatziki.
Dusting Icing Sugar
Dusted icing sugar is a way to garnish some desserts, such as pain au chocolate. Place a tablespoon of icing sugar in a sifter and gently tap it to dust your desserts with a little icing sugar.
Lemon Curd
Lemon curd is used in lemon tarts to create a tart, sharp and creamy citrusy flavor.
Lemon curd must be strained of all of the lemon rind prior to filling the tarts.
The lemon rind is strained using a sifter.
Raspberry Mousse
Raspberry mousse is one of the sweetest and creamiest mousse you’ll ever taste! It’s even better than chocolate mousse.
Raspberry mousse is made by making a raspberry sugar syrup using the thickener gelatin.
Once the syrup is made, the seeds of the raspberry must be removed.
The raspberry syrup is strained through a sifter to remove the seeds.
Check out our vegan raspberry mousse recipe that doesn’t use any gelatin in it.
What is a sifter
A sifter is a kitchen accessory that usually has a handle and metal basket. The basket has metal criss crosses creating a bowl shape that allows small pieces of food to pass through.
A sifter increases the surface area available for mixing dry ingredients into liquid ingredients.
Ingredients are more evenly spread when using a sifter which creates a balance of flavors and textures.
