What Is A Bench Scraper?

Sometimes called the baker’s knife or pastry scraper, a bench scraper is a flat rectangle of metal with a rounded handle on one side. Pastry chefs use bench scrapers to cut dough into pieces, to scrape sticky dough remains off work surfaces, to fold together soft dough before kneading, or to lift a rolled dough without stretching or tearing it. A bench scraper is also a good tool for all-around cooking use. You can use it to scrape food remains off your cutting board, and to lift chopped ingredients off the board for transferring to a cooking pot or bowl.

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A good heavy-duty bench scraper can also be used for any kitchen scraping job, including scraping stuck-on or burnt-one food from baking sheets or pans.

Since a bench scraper is used as a sort of knife to cut dough into portions, its working edge should be slightly sharp. Some bench scrapers also have divided ruler lines on the edge to help measure out portions.

The handle of a bench scraper may be formed by rounding over one end of the metal to form a rounded holder. The handle may also be a rounded piece of plastic, nylon, rubber, silicone, or wood attached to one edge.

Watch the overview of the bench scraper from CookieDaddyTV below.

Also available are plastic bowl scrapers or ‘dough scrapers’ such as the Ateco Bowl Scraper. These are more flexible than a bench scraper and come in various rounded shapes. They are very useful for removing every bit of dough from a bowl or even for scraping out every last bit of thick cake or brownie batter

Other Names for Bench Scraper

In addition to the terms baker’s knife and pastry scraper mentioned above, the bench scraper is also sometimes called a dough cutter, bench knife, or board scraper.

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