# Questions about using feed wheat for people food



## MamaTiger (Jun 11, 2008)

What are the concerns with doing this? The brand I have available locally doubles clean the wheat...I realize I would have to sort thru it manually to be sure there were no rocks or weed seeds in the bags, but are there other reasons NOT to use feed wheat for grinding for bread products for people food?

Organic wheat thru the co-op costs me about $28 for 50 lbs vs. $10 for feed wheat from the local feed store.


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## hintonlady (Apr 22, 2007)

I use our wheat crop for home use. It doesn't go into feed for the most part, it gets sold to large food manufacturers.

Double clean is great but you will still need to make a brief sort before grinding. I have had great luck. Making whole wheat loaves is completely different than white store bought flour.

We do have another thread or two about this subject if you want to search. I know the one major con against using such wheat is food safety in regards to potential molds and various other yuckies. Alan from this forum seems to have that relevant information if you don't find it in a search.

good luck


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## Cyngbaeld (May 20, 2004)

You might want to pour it in front of a fan OUTSIDE to clean it some more but it is probably fairly clean already.

Do you know if it is hard or soft? That makes a big difference in the quality of the bread. Soft is better for baking powder type breads and hard for yeast breads since it has more gluten.


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## Guest (Feb 16, 2009)

Feed wheat is fine for human use.


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## ovsfarm (Jan 14, 2003)

Around here you have to ask for cover crop wheat to get that which has not been treated with any kind of fungicides or herbicides. The treated kind is used for planting wheat crops. I have never seen that kind, so I don't know if it is that nasty pink color the treated corn is or whether it could be mistaken for untreated.


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## Jim-mi (May 15, 2002)

Heard this from a person who worked in a mill: Feed wheat is de-chaffed once and the food grade goes thru the de-chaffing three times. . . . . . . all comes from the same source.
I take a couple cups at a time, out on the porch, when the wind is blowing, and pour it from bowl to bowl. . . .works for me.
Your eye ball will tell you if there's any thing that "shouldn't be in there"

Grind it for "Cream-O-Wheat" type hot cereal and add a small amount to the hard red for bread. 

Sure beats the price they want for so called >"Organic"<


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

We bought some feed corn, the feed dealer told me it was grown by a minonite (sp) that saved his own seed each year. We grind it with our electric stone grinder and it makes the best corn bread.
It was $10.50 for 50 pounds.


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## Cyngbaeld (May 20, 2004)

ovsfarm said:


> Around here you have to ask for cover crop wheat to get that which has not been treated with any kind of fungicides or herbicides. The treated kind is used for planting wheat crops. I have never seen that kind, so I don't know if it is that nasty pink color the treated corn is or whether it could be mistaken for untreated.


You are talking about "seed wheat" and the OP is asking about "feed wheat". I wouldn't suggest anybody eat "seed wheat" and it is nearly always more expensive than the feed wheat.


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## MamaTiger (Jun 11, 2008)

No clue which type of wheat it is...I've been baking with whole wheat for quite some time now, so am familiar with soft and hard wheats. The bag says absolutely NOTHING about the contents other than feed wheat. DH called the company and they said it was double cleaned. No clue how to find out about molds/etc or even what to ask about the company about that...

So the general consensus is it's okay to use for grinding/baking?


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

I would think feed wheat would be soft white wheat.
I have some soft white wheat that we have used for bread. And we like it better than hard red winter wheat. The loaf comes out softer and more like store bought.
I would , if you can sift some of the bran out till you get more used to the fresh ground wheat.
Also it may have more broken kenals so it may not store as long as wheat that was meant for people use.


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## Guest (Feb 16, 2009)

SquashNut said:


> I would think feed wheat would be soft white wheat.


The feed wheat here is hard red.


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## SquashNut (Sep 25, 2005)

ladycat said:


> The feed wheat here is hard red.


I'll have to ask the feed store neer here. The only place I have tryed to order it from was Azure Standard and they were out at the time and it was soft white.
Any way we mix soft white and hard red when we do grind wheat for bread.
We haven't found any for a good price for awhile so we eat store bought flour and are saving the wheat we have just in case.


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## tyusclan (Jan 1, 2005)

We tried some here once. It was a soft wheat, so the gluten was a little low. Other than that it was fine. The hard wheat is much better, though, and we didn't use it again.


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## DaleK (Sep 23, 2004)

The kind of wheat will depend on where it was grown, around here feed wheat is almost always soft red because that's mostly what we grow.

They allow a bit more fusarium and other contaminants in feed wheat than in food grade wheat but I wouldn't worry about it. It is a slightly higher risk though.


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## hintonlady (Apr 22, 2007)

We have soft red but around here it is sold to make pastry flour.

Makes no never mind to us, my guys whine about it regardless. They are hooked on nasty ole bleached white flour. Personally I think that stuff is a mix of talcum powder and ground styrofoam. Makes a tasty loaf but not much worth eating.


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## Ernie (Jul 22, 2007)

My mother just came up for a visit. She's hooked on white bread. Can't abide by the stuff we have here. She complains because she can't get Mrs.Baird's bread (a Texas brand of Wonderbread). 

For some reason it just pushes my buttons. My wife goes to great trouble to make a fine loaf, even going so far as to mill various healthful grains, but still the general public would find that pasty white bread to be the superior product. 

Do they not realize that white flour and water makes paste, not bread? The very bread they eat is the reason they need to take vitamins to stay healthy and fiber to stay regular! 

You need to fix those guys right and proper right now, hintonlady, or they'll be eating prunes and bran cereal at age 30 and wondering why they're all stopped up.


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## MamaTiger (Jun 11, 2008)

When we first started making whole wheat bread, we used hard red. But I found that my bunch prefers the taste of hard white wheat. I've tried using soft white to make yeast breads and it didn't matter how much extra gluten I added, it still didn't rise well. I'm hoping this bag is filled with hard red since I can identify that by sight. lol

I guess I could call the company and ask which type of wheat they sell as feed wheat and what levels of fusarium are in their feed wheat. hmmmm

Locally, this is the only way I can buy wheat unless I go thru the co-op that delivers 2 hours away from me and costs almost triple the feed wheat. In the past we have used the co-op and I have a bit over a year of that wheat left, but I need to replace what i am using soon.


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## manygoatsnmore (Feb 12, 2005)

The labels on the feed wheat here all says double cleaned hard red - it grinds fine, bakes a good loaf of yeast bread. The last time I entered bread from it in the fair, the judge's comments asked if I'd added gluten and commented on how nice it was. I figure it must be much like bread flour. You know, back in the day, you couldn't buy "bread flour", just all purpose and cake flours...Mom turned out many a fine loaf of bread using Gold Medal All-Purpose.


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## MamaTiger (Jun 11, 2008)

Okay, let me ask another question related to this: What brand name is your feed wheat? Our's is FRM; it has nothing written on the bag other than feed wheat and the brand name.


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## Cyngbaeld (May 20, 2004)

Does the label that is sewn onto the bag have a protein content listed?


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## Pink_Carnation (Apr 21, 2006)

The only thing I could think of would be I have heard that for feed they will spray with fungicide and such that isn't approved for people.


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## wogglebug (May 22, 2004)

Pink_Carnation said:


> The only thing I could think of would be I have heard that for feed they will spray with fungicide and such that isn't approved for people.


Again, they do that for SEED wheat, NOT for feed wheat. 
They don't add any unnecessary cost to feed wheat, and they for darned sure don't add anything that would cause up to thousands of meat carcasses to be condemned.


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## MamaTiger (Jun 11, 2008)

No ingredient label at all...nothing written on the bag at all except *open here* and the brand name and *feed wheat*.


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## Macybaby (Jun 16, 2006)

We get ours out of the truck(during harvest). Usually get some spring wheat and some winter wheat. I don't know what kind it is, what ever the neighbors are growing. DH shows up with a 12 pack of beer and the Hutterites let him take several large bags full.

Some of the biggest differences between "human" and "animal" is what it tests for as far as nonfeed particles (ie: insect parts and rodent fecess). I'm not too worried about insects (more protein) and mine isn't ever stored where rodents would be a problem. 

But I sure hate winnowing it by hand. 

Cathy


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## rfd (Jan 10, 2006)

so how long can you store the feed wheat???


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## wogglebug (May 22, 2004)

rfd said:


> so how long can you store the feed wheat???


They've germinated wheat grains they found in the pyramids. If it's whole grain. stored bone dry, don't worry about it.


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## Guest (Jan 12, 2011)

Wrong thread.


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