j6 MAINE AGRICULTURAL EXPERIMENT STATION. I904. 



wheat cost the consumer in Maine about $1.80. and the entire 

 wheat flour made from the same amount cost from $2.55 to 

 $4.25. As explained above, the difference between standard 

 patent flour and entire wheat flour from the same wheat is due to 

 the 13 pounds of low grade flour and middlings separated from 

 the former, but included in the latter. The consumer in Maine of 

 entire wheat flour must, therefore, perforce pay from $.75 to 

 $2.45, or at the rate of 6 to 19 cents a pound, for these 13 pounds 

 of low grade flour and middlings. The manufacturers claim that 

 in car load lots they deliver entire wheat flour to dealers in New 

 England at practically the price of standard patent flour, and 

 that this high retail cost is due to the smallness of the demand 

 and consequent lack of competition. Since it costs no more to 

 mill wheat into entire wheat flour than into patent, and since 

 the yield is one-sixth greater in the case of entire wheat flour, 

 the manufacturers should be able to produce it for 25 to 50 cents 

 a barrel less than standard patent. The leading companies claim, 

 however, that a better wheat is used in the manufacture of en- 

 tire wheat flour than the Minneapolis millers use. Such a claim 

 cannot of course be easily disproved, but so far as the chemical 

 analyses of the flours indicate, it is not well founded. At market 

 prices the digestible nutrients other than ash furnished in entire 

 wheat flour cost the consumer from 40 to 130 per cent more than 

 in standard patent flour. To be sure, he obtains twice as much 

 ash as he would in the patent flours. The function of the ash 

 constituent is little understood, but the present state of knowl- 

 edge does not warrant the conclusion that the food in ordinary 

 mixed diet is deficient in digestible mineral matter. The use of 

 entire wheat flour for persons in health is not, therefore, as eco- 

 nomical as that of white flour. It must be remembered, how- 

 ever, that flour of all kinds is a most economical food, and that 

 entire wheat flour, even at 5 cents a pound, is still a low cost 

 food. 



