284 THE BOOK OF WHEAT 



the United States. The respective uses of hard and soft-wheat 

 flour are well defined and clearly recognized by bakers, millers, 

 and wholesale dealers. Soft-wheat flour has more starch and 

 less gluten than hard-wheat flour. It makes a whiter, and, in 

 a certain popular estimation, a more attractive loaf, but it is 

 less nutritious, and has a poorer flavor. Tenacity of gluten, so 

 essential for good bread, becomes undesirable " toughness" in 

 pastry and cake. In pastry, porosity is rendered unnecessary 

 by "shortening," and In cake it is obtained with greater deli- 

 cacy by adding the beaten albumen of eggs. Soft-wheat flour, 

 having less gluten, is most suitable for these products. The 

 thinly rolled and thoroughly baked cracker has the best color, 

 texture and crispness when made from soft-wheat flour. Pas- 

 try and cake in some of their many varied forms are so univer- 

 sally a part of the daily diet of America and Europe that soft- 

 wheat flour ^ sometimes designated in the markets as "pastry" 

 flour. 



Durum- Wheat Flour. The flour from durum wheats has 

 hitherto been used chiefly in the manufacture of macaroni and 

 similar products. Its special fitness for this is its high gluten 

 content. Bread made from this flour has a fine flavor, but a 

 dark color. Because of the latter fact, and because of the 

 fact that durum .wheat requires special milling processes, there 

 has been a prejudice against it as a bread wheat. With 

 great increase in the production of durum wheats in the Uni 

 States, these difficulties are being removed, and it is very 

 probable that its use for bread-making will greatly increase. 

 It has long been used as a bread wheat in parts of Russia and 

 France. 



Graham 1 Flour contains the whole grain, and is made by 

 cleaning the wheat and grinding it to a moderate degree of 

 fineness. Soft wheat is the most suitable for making this 

 flour, which, however, is used chiefly for bread. 



Entire- Wheat Flour is prepared by a process similar to that 

 used in milling graham flour, only that between the cleaning 

 and grinding it is run through a machine which removes the 

 three outer layers of the berry. This leaves the cerealin in 

 the flour, but removes the bran. This also is a bread flour. 



1 So called from Graham, a temperance reformer of a century 

 ago, who advocated bread made from unbolted meal as an aid in 

 curing alcoholism. 



