Basic HTML Version
August 1971
dusted wíth methyl bromíde to keep the
wheat from spoíling in the bins. It ís
apparently retaíned within tbe grain to
sorne degree. Thís chemical ís in addí–
tion to any resídue left from appli–
catíons of insecticides. Hopefully they
do not contamínate the flour after ít has
been mílled. But is that hope just a
blind assumptíon?
Then, once tbe flour has been
ground, it is aged.
Severa! chemicals will induce arti-
Th~
PLAIN TRUTII
bread batter. I t
has
to be conditioned
for easier machine production. Calcium
stearyl-2-lactylate and sodium stearyl
fumarate are widely used. The recipe
also calls for a pinch of softeners and
emulsifiers to maintain it even when the
bread goes stale. Bakers can use lecithin,
polyoxyethylene monostearate, stearyl tar–
trate, or partial glycerol esters.
However fresh the loa"f may
seem,
it
can still go stale. Bread often sits on the
grocery store shelf for much longer peri-
hea
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,
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ENDOSPERM
.. . about 83°.4 of the kernel
Cellelew Wellt
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ficial aging. Nitrogen trichloride, com–
monly called agene, was used widely
until 1956. when its use was dis–
continued because it seemed to cause fits
in dogs and had been traced to certain
eye problems. Chlorine dioxide is used
most commonly today. Chlorine dioxide
bleaches, ages and preserves the flour in
one operation. It also destroys the oils
- such as linoleic acid, or vitamin F -
and destroys methionine, an essential
amino acid.
Once tbe flour is bleached, aged and
sterilized, it is still not ready for the
Source of white flour.
BRAN
... about 1<41f2% of the kernel
lncluled in whole wheat flour but more
often removed and used in animal
or poultry feed .
GERM
.. . obout 21f2% of the kemel
The embryo or sprouting section of the
seed, uaually seporated becouse it
contains fa t which limits the keeping
quality of flours. Available seporately
as human food, but usually added lo
animal or poultry feed.
Courlesy
of Wheot
Flour
fn<titute
ods of time than most shoppers would
care to know. Production bakeries there–
fore must add chemical stale-inhibitors.
These inhibitors - induding mono–
and diglycerides, di -ace.tytartaric acid
esters of mono· and diglycerides, and
su'ccinylated mono- and diglycerides -
don't reaUy keep the bread from spoil–
ing. They just make it
LOOK
fresh.
Paradoxically, it may well be due to the
lack of protein in the bread - or a
poor
qualíty of protein which helps
speed staleness.
According to a paper published by
37
Dr. Stig R. Erlander and Leatrice G. Er–
lander in the scientific journal
Die
Starke,
vol.
21,
pp. 305-315 (1969),
the staling of bread occurs when there
is
a decrease in the amount of protein.
By using good whole wheat flour of
high protein content, the staling of
bread can be essentially eliroinated.
Sorne Other Additions
But we have not yet baked our bread.
The recipe calls for still more chemicals.
Even though microorganísms would
have a hard time surviving in the stuff,
commercial bread dough must have mold
and "rope" inhibitors and preservatives
to ward off that tell-tale black carpet
which means the bread is not exactly
oven-fresh. Calcium propionate and so–
díum propionate are the main in–
gredients. Other substances have also
been used - mainly sodium diacetate,
bromates, pcrsulphates, acid calcium
phosphate, ammonium chloride, fungal
amylases, bacteria! proteases, and a few
otbers.
Once all tbe chemicals have been
added, a modero bakery can produce
multiple thousands of loaves which will
look the same, taste the same, and stay
tbe same!
No one really knows how harmful
the chemicals roay be. You eat them
with the bread. When Dr. Robert S.
Harris of the Nutritional Bíochemical
Laboratory at Massachusetts Institute of
Technology once fed a certain anti-stal–
ing agent ( sorbitan mono laurate) to a
group of rats, most of them died within
ten days. But as yet, the chemicals used
in commercial bread have not enjoyed
the same infamy as cyclamates or
saccharin.
Perhaps more important than the
addition of chemicals, however, is the
removaJ
of certain
NATURAL
nutrients in
wheat.
Eccentrics?
The shortcomings of bleached white
flour have been warned against repeat–
edly by students of nutrition since the
days when Sylvester Graham (origina–
toe of Graham flour) denounced the
bread sold by certai"n Boston bakers.
At the time, those outraged roer–
chants made an unsuccessíul attempt to
keep him quiet. For years persons such