Selecting Wheat Genotypes for Whole Grain Cookies

Increased consumption of whole grain cereal products has many health benefits. Using an experimental whole grain flour-milling system, these researchers with USDA’s Agricultural Research Service and The Ohio State Univ. evaluated soft-wheat winter wheat genotypes in whole grain flour for use in cookies.

Grain from 14 soft winter wheat cultivars grown in two locations within two crop years was milled using a short-flow flour mill to produce white flour, and then the bran was ground and reconstituted with a white flour to produce a whole-wheat flour for comparison baking.

Flour samples were evaluated with the solvent retention capacity test and the wire-cut cookie method. Bran fractions were analyzed for water-extractable nonstarch polysaccharides. Whole grain flour cookie diameter could be estimated from the diameter of cookies made with white flour.

The group found that the best predictive models for whole grain wire-cut cookie performance were based on milling softness equivalent and the whole grain sucrose SRC test.

Greater softness equivalents and smaller whole grain sucrose SRC values were predictive of larger cookie diameters. Variation in whole grain cookie diameter and texture was due to total water extractable arabinoxylan and the arabinose:xylose ratio in the bran.

The researchers stated that early generation selection for whole grain characteristics can use softness equivalent and cookie quality information from white flour. However,  identification of the lines with uniquely superior whole grain flour quality may require whole grain flour analysis.


Summary adapted from:

Edward J. Souza, Mary J. Guttieri and Clay Sneller
Selecting Soft Wheat Genotypes for Whole Grain Cookies
doi:10.2135/cropsci2010.05.0263
Crop Science 2011 51:189-197
[ Abstract ]          

Photo by USDA ARS