I have had people ask me why I take the time to grind wheat berries. The answer is quite simple…
Ready?
Oh my gosh! It is SO much better than the preground flour you buy at the store! The taste is fresh and wheaty…it smells wonderful. All of the vitamins and nutrients are intact..and the flavor of the finished product is fabulous.
And yeah, it’s cheaper.
The wheat that I like best is a hard white high protien berry. The flour is lighter than the traditional hard red, has a more delicate flavor and the higher protein gives the dough more elasticity so it is easier to work with. Locally, I have my natural foods store special order it for me by the 25lb or 50 lb bag…25 lbs is about $8.50..The preground whole wheat flour, not even organic, is selling for over $3 for 5 lbs…so you can see that it is cost effective.
Wheat berries store longer..almost indefinitely. Add a few bay leaves to the storage container and the wheat will stay bug free.
O.k…so now you are convinced. What do you need?
You need to look for a good wheat grinder. You are probably going to want an electric one because it takes for ever to hand mill enough wheat for a loaf of bread. I like mine alot, although it does sound like a Boeing 747 taking off.
Next you need a supply for wheat. There are severl different types of wheat berries. “soft” refers to a wheatberry without much gluten and these are best for cake and pastry baking. “Hard” refers to what is normally used for bread. Decide if it is important to you to pay the extra for organic or not. Expect to pay around $10 or so for a 25 lb bag.
These are what the wheatberries look like. You can actually cook them and use them like barley in their whole grain state..they are very good.
Besure to check the berries over carefully before putting them in the grinder. Once in awhile they will have a litle stone in them and it will really mess up the grinding burrs. Choose the size grind and start your engine!
It is messy. In nice weather we gind outside most often to keep the fine flour dust from settling on everything. It takes about 10 minutes of grinding to grind 5 lbs of flour..
And there it is..fresh, whole wheat flour. Full of vitamins, but most of all , full of flavor.
With a mill you can also grind various types of dry beans, soy beans to make soy flour (necessary for homemade tofu..that is fun to make!), oat groats for oat flour and nearly any other nonoily type of seed or bean you can think of.
Interested in getting one for yourself? Here are the three I recommend. Just click on the image for more details.
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