DIGESTII^ILITY AND NITKITIM: \\\LUE OF BREAD 



AND OF MACARONI 



THE DlfxESTIBILITY AND NUTRITIVH VALUE OF BREAD. 



INTRODUCTION. 



Some years ago it was estimated that the amount of wheat consumed 

 annually in the United States was 4.5 bushels per capita. This would 

 be equivalent to about 200 pounds of Hour. Later estimates place 

 the quantit}' at 6.23 bushels, which would be equal to 277 pounds of 

 flour. Because of its importance no article of food has received more 

 attention from investigators during recent years than flour. In 1897 

 an extended series of experiments was undertaken at the Maine and 

 the Minnesota experiment stations to determine the digestibility and 

 nutritive value of different grades of flour prepared from the same 

 and from diflerent kinds of wheat. Preceding bulletins of this Ofiice 

 contain accounts of the results of investigations at the Maine" and 

 Minnesota'' stations for 1897 to 1902; similar work at the latter station 

 for 1903—1 is reported herein. 



The general plan of these investigations has been to prepare the 

 three common t3'pes of flour — Graham, entire-wheat, and standard 

 patent — from the same lot of wheat, and then determine their com- 

 parative digestibility and nutritive value by experiments with bread 

 made from the flours. As stated in a former report,'" Graham Hour is 

 unbolted ground wheat; entire-wheat flour contains all of the wheat 

 kernel with the exception of a portion of the bran which is removed 

 with a coarse screen, while the standard patent, or, as hereafter desig- 

 nated, straight-grade, flour contains neither the bran nor the germ, 

 but is fine white flour which has passed through a No. 14 bolting cloth 

 with 193,211 meshes per square inch. 



The necessity for confining the comparisons to samples prepared 

 from the same lot of wheat has also been pointed out.'' It is not pos- 

 sible to compare accurately the nutritive values of the various types 



«U. S. Dept. Agr., Office of Experiment Stations Buls, 85, 143. 



b U. S. Dept. Agr., Office of Experiment Stations Bula. 67, 101, 126. 



cU. S. Dept. Agr., Office of Experiment Stations Bnl. 101, p. 8. 



d\J. S. Dept. Agr., Office of Experiment Stations Buis. 101, p. 6; 126, p. 8. 



(9) 



