Bread flour

Bread flour typically is milled from hard red spring wheat kernels, with high protein-to-starch ratio, and is capable of holding a lot of water – 2 cups flour holds 1 cup water. It can produce the largest loaves of any flour, because it has a high amount of protein.

Hard wheat yield flour that is high in good quality protein. Such flour has high water absorption power (WAP), good mixing and fermentation tolerance and good gas retention power, and are excellent for bread making.

Protein becomes gluten and forms an interlocking network of elastic strands that trap the gas produced by yeast, causing the dough to rise. Without gluten, raised bread is hard to imagine.

Wheat is the only common cereal grain that contains sufficient glutenin and gliadin for the formation of good-quality gluten for bread making.

Bread flour produces stronger dough. The strong gluten matrix provides structure to rising dough and gives the end product a nice, chewy texture.
Bread flour

Wheat flour for baking bread

Bakery foods are the major cereal products available to consumers and bread has been the principal food in over half of the countries around the world.

The history of the bakery is parallel to the history of human civilization – the bread could have been one of the first foods processed by man and was certainly is the first to be produced on a large scale.

Bread is either leavened or unleavened. Leavened bread is made from a mixture of flour, yeast, salt and water. Unleavened bread does not contain yeast and therefore does not rise. It is a flat bread that is quicker to make than yeast-bread.

Wheat is more popular than any other cereal grain for use in baked goods. Its popularity stems from the gluten that forms when flour is mixed with water. Without gluten, raised bread is hard to imagine. Wheat is also preferred because of its mild, nutty flavor.

Bread flour typically is milled from hard red spring wheat kernels, with high protein-to-starch ratio, and is capable of holding a lot of water – 2 cups flour holds 1 cup water. It can produce the largest loaves of any flour, because it has a high amount of protein.

When flour is mixed with water, glutenin and gliadin form strands of gluten, important in the structure of baked goods. The main function of gluten in dough during dough mixing is to swell and hold water, forming cells with strong elastic walls which capture carbon dioxide formed during fermentation.

Wheat is the only common cereal grain that contains sufficient glutenin and gliadin for the formation of good-quality gluten for bread making.
Wheat flour for baking bread

Nutrients in rye and rye bread

Rye is a common cereal grain related to wheat. Rye was domesticated in northern Europe in the fourth century BC and independently in Asia and the Middle East. The major sugars in rye are sucrose and raffinose. The fatty acid component of rye is linoleic acid to be major fatty acid followed by oleic acid and palmitic acid.

Rye is a good source of fiber, which is especially important in the United States and industrial countries since most of them do not get enough fiber in their diets.

Rye fiber is richly endowed with non-cellulose polysaccharides, which have exceptionally high water-binding capacity and quickly give a felling of fullness and satiety, making bread a real help for anyone trying to lose weight.

Rye protein, like wheat protein, is deficient in the essential amino acid, lysine.

Many types of rye breads and rolls are produce in different areas of the world. Germany alone produces more than 200 different varieties of rye breads.

The dough produced by rye flour is less elastic than wheat dough, and the breads therefore tend to be heavy and flat unless the rye flour is mixed with wheat to aid leavening and lighten the color.

Rye breads vary in crumb color from practically white to a very dark color in shape for round to elongated loaves, and in taste from a mildly sour flavor to a storng, distinctive acid taste.
Nutrients in rye and rye bread

Enriched white bread

Enriched refers to the process by which the B vitamin, thiamin, riboflavin, niacin, folic acid, and the mineral iron are added to refined grain and grain products at level specified by law.

Enriched white bread has vitamins and minerals added to bring it up to the whole grain level (usually B1, B2, niacin and iron are added). Addition of calcium is optional, but if added it might meet specified levels.

Since it does not contain the wheat germ, it does no supply as wide an assortment of vitamins and minerals as whole wheat bread. When bread or rolls are enriched with nutrients such as vitamins, minerals, wheat germ or amino acid, this stated on the wrapper.

A single of refined enriched bread is not ‘rich’ in the enrichment nutrients, but people who eat several servings a day obtain significantly more of the relevant nutrients than they would from unenriched refined prduct.

Although some nutrients are added back in a process called fortification, enriched white bread contains less fiber and nutrients than whole grain breads.
Enriched white bread