| If only I had the space to grow my own wheat…
July 1979 So much field work is being done by local farmers that the landscape along the road changes each time I go to town. What was a gold plated expanse of wheat in the morning is nothing but a short stubble by early afternoon and then transformed to a soft brown carpet of disced earth by nightfall. Resounding in the air is the throb of trucks, tractors and combines as working hours are extended almost indefinitely in order to take advantage of favorable weather conditions. Now in the middle of all the other household and garden work pressing to be done is the time to take some covered containers to the field to fill with wheat fresh from the combine. If it is kept in a fairly cool place the wheat can be used for flour and cereal until next harvest. The flavor of products made from home grown wheat is excellent and the nutritive quality is unsurpassed. It would be great to have a home flour mill, which is available on the market, but if you don’t, a good blender can make both wheat cereal and flour. To do so, wash a quart or two of wheat. Remove the chaff that floats to the top and dry thoroughly. It usually requires several hours to dry. If you want to make whole wheat flour, put ½ cup of dry wheat in a blender and turn to a high speed. You will get almost 1 cup of flour. Feel the texture with your fingers and continue until the flour feels quite smooth but with some crunchiness left in it. Continue making flour until blender gets hot, then stop and wait for it to cool down. Make only enough for immediate use, since this flour will be free of preservatives. Consequently, its shelf life is short. The finished product is not as fine textured as whole wheat flour in the stores but it makes bread with a wonderful satisfying flavor. To prepare wheat to eat as a cereal proceed the same way as for flour but stop the blender when the grains have been cracked several times. Some will be fine and some coarse. Stir into boiling salted water and simmer for twenty minutes. Serve warm with light cream and brown sugar. This can also be enjoyed at dinner or supper as a paste or potato replacement. |
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| Whole Wheat Bread Sticks | |||
| 2 cups white flour | 2 cups milk | ||
| 1 cup oatmeal | 2 eggs | ||
| 1 tablespoon sugar | 2 tablespoons fat | ||
| 2 teaspoons salt | 2 tablespoons molasses | ||
| 1 pkg. dry yeast | 4 cups whole wheat flour | ||
| Mix first five ingredients in large mixing bowl. Scald milk. Cool to 115 to 120°. Add milk, eggs, fat, and molasses to dry ingredients. Beat on medium speed 10 minutes. Remove beaters. Add more wheat flour stirring it in with a spoon until too stiff to handle. Turn out on bread board and knead for 5 minutes. Set to rest in a bowl. Cover with damp towel and keep at about 80° for 1 ½ to 2 hours. Punch down. Divide in 3 or 4 parts. Cover with damp towel. Let rest 10 minutes. Roll each piece out on a lightly floured board to ½ inch thickness. Cut in strips 5 inches long and 1/3 inch wide. Put on greased cookie sheets. Let rise at room temperature for 1 hour. Bake at 375° for 20 minutes or until brown. Remove from pan and cool on cake racks. Eat as is or return to 325° oven and bake until hard and crisp. Store in air tight containers or plastic bags.These are good served with cheese, fruit and milk. As a snack for children they are tops in nutrition. Kids will eat them instead of cookies which are too full of fat and sugar to be eaten as a regular part of the diet. | |||
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Whole Wheat Flour and Making it Yourself | The Farmer's Wife said,
July 19, 2013 @ 12:47 pm
[…] July 5th I posted an article from July 1979 about making your own flour, here is an article from a year […]