Frosted wheat

[dfarms11]

Just curious since all our wheat is now feed because of frost, what affect does frost have on making flour? Or on the baking qualities?

[charliep]

Depends on how bad a frost, sprout and bushel weight.
Combination of things that impact falling number will affect the
ability of bread to rise. Good falling number other things equals
equals a nice fluffy loaf of bread. Poor flour equals poor baking
qualities. Just ask anyone who makes bread about the importance
of good flour.

If the impact of frost is lighter bushel weights and small kernels,
then the likely impact is lower flour yields and flecking (shows up
as greyer flour)/more requirement to bleach the flour. Less starch
in the kernel and a seed cover that is more difficult to remove.

[wmoebis]

When talking to millers they say that a little bran frost is not bad. The bran is looser and actually comes off easier. This is reflected in the degree of soundness in the grade grading guide and is showen in the standards. There can be light bran frost in a #1 however next to no harder or green frost.

It is when the frost gets deeper and the bran accually adheres to the kernal like charlie says making it harder to grind and separate the bran from endosperm. When the frost is early enough, hard enough and long enough the kernal will remain green and frosted becoming very hard and harder to mill. The millers will have to make more passes to grind the kernals or depends on the kind of mill, put more pressure on mill. This causes the softer not frose kernals to become too fine. More passes or more pressure cost them more to mill.

when there is green frost, again like charlie said they have to add more bleach to whiten or finer milling (sifting) to get rid of the speciness. This also costs them more so the value is less.

The amount and degree of frost are progresively heavier in the grades and are represented in the degree of soundness in each grade and shows in the standard.

There is also the visual aspect. Not unlike one going to buy a car. Two identical cars both preform great, run nice but one has been keyed and scratched we would not pay as much for that one.

Over the years you will have seen more frost in our standards. Today we have more frost than say 20 years ago. This has a lot to do with more modern milling processes and automaation in contoling mills and better bleaching techniques.

[nashty]

It will be interesting to see if 4 CWRS will be a grade that can be used this year. Central Alberta has a pile of frosty wheat and it would be a $20/mt premium if we can get it baought as a 4 CWRS. Anyone get offered a 4?