with customers who appreciate nicely flavoured bread, will “pitch” into their trough a certain proportion of English country flour, that is, flour milled entirely or chiefly from English wheat, which under such conditions is strengthened by a blend of strong flour, a patent flour for choice. It has been objected that as English wheat contains a large proportion of starch, and as starch is admittedly destitute of flavour, there is no reason why flour milled from English wheat should possess a sweeter flavour than any other starchy wheat flour. Experience, however, has amply proved that well-ripened English wheat produces bread with an agreeable flavour, though it does not follow that all English wheat is under all conditions capable of baking bread of the highest quality. But it would be as fallacious to hold that weak flour is necessarily flavoury, as that all strong flour is insipid and harsh. Different wheats are undoubtedly possessed of different flavours, but not all these flavours are of a pleasing character. In some cases the very reverse is true. Californian and Australian wheats have occasionally aromatic odours, due to the presence of certain seeds, that will impart an objectionable flavour to the resultant bread.
While the essential character of particular wheats will account for a good deal of the flavour that may be detected in the bread made from them, the baking process must also be responsible to some extent for flavour. The temperature of the oven and the degree of fermentation must be factors in the question. It has been asserted that the same flour will bake into bread of very different flavour according as the fermentation is carried out slowly or quickly, or as the oven is hot or the reverse. A high temperature seems to have the effect of quickly drawing out the subtle essences which go to give flavour to the bread, but it is a question whether they are not subsequently rapidly volatilized and partially or wholly lost. The rapid formation of a solid crust is no doubt likely to retain some of these flavouring essences. A moist, or “slack,” sponge, or dough, appears distinctly favourable to the retention of flavour, the theory being that under such conditions the yeast, having more room to “breathe,” works more easily, and is therefore less likely to convert into food those soluble constituents of the flour which give flavour.
The colour of flour is a valuable, though not an infallible, index to its baking qualities. Thus, a flour of good colour, by which bakers mean a flour of bright appearance, white, but not a dull dead white, will usually bake into a loaf of good appearance. At the same time, a flour of Colour of flour. pronounced white tint may bake into a dirty grey loaf. This has been particularly noted in the case of flours milled in Argentina. The colour of flour will vary from a rich, creamy white to a dull grey, according to its quality. The different shades are many and various, but the prevailing tints are comparatively few. Perhaps Blandy’s classification of the colours as white, yellow, red, brown and grey is as serviceable as any. Each of these tints is directly caused by the presence of certain substances. White denotes the presence of a considerable proportion of starch, while a pronounced yellow tint proclaims gluten of more or less good quality. Red and brown are tints only found in flours of low grade, because they are sure proofs of an undue proportion of branny or fibrous particles. A greyish flour invariably contains impurities, such as crease dirt, from the wheat, the intensity of the tint varying in proportion to their amount. With regard to a yellow tint, though this always denotes the presence of gluten, it is difficult to estimate the baking quality of the flour by the shade of yellow. In the best Hungarian patent flour the whole sample will be suffused by an amber tint, known to Budapest and Vienna bakers as gelblicher Stich. Rolls baked from the best Hungarian flour will not infrequently cut yellow as if eggs had been used in making them up, though nothing more than flour, yeast and water has been employed. Strong flour milled from American or Canadian spring wheat is also yellowish in colour, but the tint is not so deep as with Hungarian flour. On the other hand, there are flours of no great strength, such as those from some Australian wheats, which are apt to look yellow. When the colour of flour is not maintained in the bread, the reason is generally to be found in the baking process employed. Colour is a fairly trustworthy, but not an absolute guide to the chemical composition of flour.
Unfortunately not all flour of good colour is sound for bread-making purposes. Wheat which has been harvested in a damp condition, or has been thoroughly soaked, by drenching showers previous to cutting, or has got wet in the stook, is liable, unless carefully handled, to produce flour Damp and flour. that will only bake flat, sodden loaves. Wheat which has received too much rain as it is approaching maturity, and has then been exposed to strong sunlight, is peculiarly liable to sprout. This seems to happen not infrequently to La Plata wheat, and though wheat shippers in that country are usually careful to clean off the little green spikes, this outward cleansing does not remedy the mischief wrought to the internal constitution of the berry. Such wheat makes flour lacking in strength and stability. Its gluten is immature and low in percentage, while the soluble albuminoids are in high percentage and in a more or less active diastasic state. The starch granules are liable to have weakened or fissured walls, and the proportion of moisture and of soluble extract will be high. With regard to the beneficial action of kiln or other drying on damp flour, William Jago was convinced by a series of experiments that the gentle artificial drying of flour increases its water-absorbing capacity to about three times the amount of water lost by evaporation. On the other hand, a damp flour dried too quickly and at too great a heat is liable to be made more instead of less susceptible to diastasic changes.
Alum.—Strictly speaking, when employed with weak and unstable flours alum is a remedial agent. The popular idea that it acts as a kind of bleacher of flour, having the faculty of converting flour that is dark-coloured through containing a sensible proportion of branny particles and woody fibre, into white-coloured loaves, is erroneous. Its action as a producer of white bread is indirect, not direct, though it is none the less effective. It seems to act as a brace to or steadier of unstable gluten. If from the same wheat a certain proportion of gluten be extracted and divided into two parts, of which one is placed in a glass of water containing a strong solution of alum, and the other in a glass of plain water, the gluten in the latter case will become spent days and perhaps weeks before the sample in the alumed water is disintegrated. The place of alum in the process of fermentation is well marked. By holding together unstable gluten, it checks the diastasic action, and the proportion of starch converted into glucose (grape sugar) is reduced, with the result that a whiter and more porous loaf is produced. It is generally admitted that by the use of alum more or less eatable bread may be baked from flour which otherwise could hardly be made into bread at all. Strictly, therefore, this substance is not an adulterant, inasmuch as it is not a substitute in any sense for flour. But it is admittedly unwholesome, and therefore its legal interdiction for alimentary purposes is quite justifiable. Another aspect of the use of alum is that it is employed for the purpose of enabling bakers to use poor flour.
A fairly satisfactory test for alum in bread (or flour) is afforded by an alkaline solution of logwood and a saturated solution of ammonium carbonate. The presence of alum is shown by a lavender or full blue colour. The depth of the tint is said to be a rough guide to the quantity of alum present. According to Jago this test is so sensitive that it has resulted in the detection of 7 grains of alum in a 4-℔ loaf.
Besides alum, small quantities of copper sulphate have been used for checking diastasis and retarding fermentation. This substance has the same effect as alum, but as all copper salts are active poisons, the employment of copper sulphate is most strongly to be condemned.
Lime-water.—The object of using either alum or copper sulphate is to check over-rapid diastasis during fermentation. Baron Liebig pointed out a much less objectionable means of attaining the same end by means of lime-water, about 112 oz. of fresh quicklime being dissolved in the water used for doughing one sack of flour. Bread made in this way is said to be spongy in texture, of agreeable flavour, and perfectly free from acidity. In the baked loaf the lime is transformed into calcium carbonate (chalk) by the carbon dioxide resulting from the panary fermentation. It is said that an increased yield of bread may be obtained by the use of lime-water; the explanation may be that lime-water, by retarding the degradation of the gluten and the diastasis of the starch, increases the water-retaining power of the flour, so that the same weight of flour yields a greater volume of bread.
Unvesiculated and Vesiculated Bread.—Wheaten bread may be divided into two main divisions, unvesiculated and vesiculated. The term vesiculated simply means provided with vesicles, or small membranous cavities, such as are found in all bread that has been treated by yeast, leaven or any other agent for rendering it spongiform in structure by the action of carbonic acid gas. Nearly all bread eaten by civilized folk is vesiculated, though
