DIET DISCOVERY

Evening Star, Issue 23665, 27 August 1940, Page 10

DIET DISCOVERY

IMPORTANT BREAD PROCESS EVOLVED WHEAT GERM INCLUDED IN WHITE LOAF ALL BAKERS TO BE GIVEN FORMULA [Special to the ‘ Star.’[ WELLINGTON, August 26. A process has been evolved by the New Zealand Wheat Research Institute which will enable the nutritive qualities of the wheat germ to be included in bread made from white flour, thus giving it the advantages of wholemeal bread. It has been fully tested, work on the process having continued for a year so that all technical difficulties could bo overcome. The formula for making this bread is being sent to all bakers in the Dominion, so that they can raaku the new bread if the demand arises. Announcing this important development, ' Dr M'Millan, Minister in Charge of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research, remarked that white flour consists of the ground endosperm 6f tho wheat grain, most of the bran and germ being removed in the milling process. “ Since tho discovery of vitamins,” continued Dr M’Millan, “ it has been realised that one special vitamin, called vitamin 81, exists in tho wheat germ in rather high proportions, and that there is hardly any other common foodstuff that contains this special vitamin to a similar extent. People who live very largely on a diet of -white brekd may therefore suffer in health for want of vitamin 81, although those who have a reasonably mixed diet, including meat, vegetables, and fruit, probably’ secure a supply sufficient for all their needs. “ There is, however,” continued the .Minister, “ an insistent demand for the inclusion of this germ in bread. This led to considerable use of bread made from wholemeal, which, of course, includes the germ. Wholemeal bread is. however, disliked by many people as a constant article of diet, so that numerous attempts have been made to incorporate tho wheat germ in white bread. They have nearly all in the past resulted in the loaf being either unpalatable to most people or one that required special processes of manufacture with a consequent increased cost. It would, therefore, be valuable if any process could be devised for incorporating the germ in white bread by tho methods .applicable to ordinary bakers’ practice, and producing a loaf palatable to most people.” How the disadvantages have been overcome is described by Dr M’Millan, who explained that in 1939 Mr E. W. Hullett, chief chemist of the Wheat Research Institute, Christchurch, in considering the nature of the chemical action involved, formulated the hypothesis that the injurious effect of the germ on the loaf could he overcome by a process of pre-fermentation. One of the bakers of tho institute, on Mr Hullett’s suggestion, applied the hypothesis to baking practice in the institute’s bakeroom and found that adoption of the principle of pre-fermentation of the germ resulted in a germ loaf that was almost indistinguishable from ordinary white bread. 1 “ The germ,” concluded Dr M’Millan, " may bo included in bread in various concentrations. Wholemeal bread contains only 2 per cent, of the germ, but by the new process, a 4 per cent, germ gives a loaf hardly distinguishable from ordinary white bread. It has good volume and texture, a slightly greyish colour, but almost no distinctive flavour. When up to 10 per cent, germ is used the loaf has a slight flavour of the germ and is of light brown colour, but in volume and texture is exactly like white bread. Feeding trials have been carried out at the Medical School, Dunedin, by the Nutrition Research Department of the New Zealand Medical Research Council. ' These showed that the nutritive properties of the germ are retained in bread made by this process.”