How Can I Make Flour More White When Under Process In Flour Mill

My father is a flour miller. He wants to know how he can make wheat, or flour more specifically, whiter during the milling process. Is there anything that can be done before in preparation or after the process?

Best Answer

Flour will whiten over time when stored. It generally takes several months to get a whiter color. Most flour manufacturers wish to speed this process up and so they actually bleach the flour using cholrine or benzoyl peroxide. This bleaching process also removes nutrietns which is why flour in the U.S. that has been bleached must also be "fortified" by having nutrients added back in.

There isn't much you can do beforehand. After milling, you can either bleach for immediate affect or store and allow it to whiten naturally. Keep in mind that different flours are usually bleached with different chemicals depending on what you plan to do with the flour.

I'll leave it to you to decide if it's worth the time and nutritional value to mix chemicals in to your flour for what is purely a cosmetic benefit.

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How do you whiten flour?

Flour bleaching agents are added directly to the freshly-milled flour. Powder bleaching agents such as benzoyl peroxide are mixed directly with the flour. Whitening is often completed in two days. Gaseous bleaching agents such as nitrogen peroxide and chlorine are fed into a bin containing the freshly-milled flour.

What is added to white flour during manufacture?

The nutrients calcium, iron and the B vitamins (niacin and thiamin), which are legally required in all white and brown flours, are also added.

How can you improve the quality of flour?

In the tempering the moisture content of wheat grains is increased to 15.5% by adding an adequate amount of water. The addition of different enzymes (cellulase, xylanase, and beta-glucanase) to the tempering solution has been tested in order to modify the quality of the resulting flour.

Wheat milling. How flour is milled. break roller reduction roller.Machinery used in wheat milling

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