FLOUR AND GLUTEN.

Auckland Star, Volume XXX, Issue 10, 13 January 1899, Page 2

FLOUR AND GLUTEN.

(To the Editor.)

Sir, —In your issue of Friday last I noticed an article on flour and gluten from mixed wheats. I should like to know if the writer refers to the Avheats of New Zealand, or to the wheats of Australia, as there is a great difference between the hard wheats of South Australia and the soft wheats of this colony. The Victorian wheat is much harder.so are the wheats of some parts of Xew South Wales. Although some varieties of wheat do well in this colony, others do not. The climate of the Auckland province seems to encourage the growth of straw, consequently a starchy wheat with a thick skin which yields a white flour, but the gluten is ' hot of the strong class of gluten, although in some cases, if the soil is of a clayey nature with limestone formation, and there is not too much rain, the grain will hold its own with the best. As regards the gluten, quality or quantity, or mixing, that is, I think, a question for the miller to decide. A practical miller will be able to judge the samples of wheat he is treating, and will know the varieties of the different wheat he is stocking—the hard wheats, soft wheats, wheats ,pf limestone or volcanic soil—and he will clean and then blend with as much care as a merchant will blend his tea. He will know how long to let them be together before breaking down to flour. Wheat seems to blend better than flour—it grinds better, dresses better, purifies better, and gives better returns than when worked separately. It gives the baker no trouble, but it is seldom done in the colonies. The wheat is rushed through the mill as it comes in, consequently the baker finds his flour a 'bit off,' as he calls it, and no wonder. The millers' in the Old Country are very careful in their mixing of wheats, and use as many as S, 10, or even more different wheats. If one variety runs out, an equivalent is found, and he studies above everything to keep up the standard of his flour. I think for the poor bread we sometimes get the baker is not always to blame. The millers must, I think, know something about it, and they might ask themselves the question, what improvement they have made in flour the last 25 years from a baker's point of view?—l am, etc., J.W.