BAKING OF GOOD BREAD

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXXI, 23 June 1937, Page 3

BAKING OF GOOD BREAD

RESEARCH INSTITUTE’S EXPERIMENTS VALUE OF THE FARINOGRAPH An investigation of some of the factors involved in the baking of good bread was being investigated in the laboratory, reported the director (Dr. F W. Hilgendorf), at a meeting of the Wheat Research Institute. The changes which took place during the fermentation of dough were not at all understood, and some revolutionary ideas had been recently promulgated, said the director. The laboratory staff was now equipped both by training and apparatus to investigate some of these fundamental problems, and their elucidation might throw important light on baking practice. Since Ist March, 1076 milling and baking trials of wheat had been carried out, and 3030 flours baked. T n spite of Mr Hullett's absence, it had been possible, through the presence of Mr H. T. Shattock, a National Re search Scholar, trained at Canterbury University College, to lay down a definite scheme of research work with considerable chances of getting something concrete accomplished. Treated broadly, the problem resolved itself into a series of studies on panary fermentation. The laboratory had gone sufficiently far to be able to say that the problem was strictly biochemical ir; nature and to realise that the published work on the subject had done little to elucidate matters. There was an enormous field awaiting investigation, and it was hoped that certain aspects of the problem would be cleared up. ■' FARINOGRAPH CONCLUSIONS The visit of Dr. Abdon, a Swedish chemist, who had recently spent a month in New Zealand representing the firm of Brabender, had been of great benefit to the institute in connection with the farinograph, said the director. The institute thus now had a better understanding of the machine’s capabilities and that it had been used as well as could be expected was shown by Mr Abdon’s examination of a large number of Dr. Frankel’s farinograms, and his reoort that, with only one or two minor exceptions, the institute had classined the wheats in their correct order. The markedly superior baking quality of Cross 7 as compared with Tuscan had also been known to the institute for some time from the many farinograms it had of both varieties, a point which Mr Abdon had,also stressed. • During May the flour section of the Wheat Committee had drawn sufficiently large samples from the monthly tests to enable the institute to farinograph the flour from every mill from which samples were taken. There was quite a large amount of variation shown among the various mills, a variation which would be expected when the locality of those mills was laken into account The baking value )f a mill flour—the value which would je placed on it by bakers who were ictually using it—was, in the institute’s opinion, best assessed by an actual taking test. “MOST HELPFUL” It could be said quite definitely that a flour scoring 33 to 35 on the institute’s system and with average fermentation requirements would never give trouble in the bakehouse. When, however, a flour scored only 25 to 28 on the institute’s test, the farinograph was most helpful in diagnosing just where the trouble lay. The value of the farinograph wa« most clearly seen in testing wheats, continued the director. The institute was not convinced that the machine told the whole story—by the nature of the raw material with which the institute was working, it would be absurd to expect any one test to give the true value of a new wheat in a blend—but it did tell much more than the single baking test. The value of the farinograph as a means to better mill control, particularly with reference to conditioning had also been discussed with Mr Abdon, whose visit had done much to allay criticism of flour and wheat testing methods as practised in England and on the Continent. All the wheats received this year for testing had been classified by variety and locality, said the director This was a piece of work for which the institutet had been waiting for years and it was likely to become of increasing value as time went on.