When I first started with food storage, I thought wheat was wheat. Then my sister-in-law started talking about different kinds of wheat, and I was like “What?!” I am so confused! Since then, I have learned the difference between hard white and red wheat and the benefits.
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Red vs White Wheat
First, why wheat? Wheat is a great item for food storage! Here’s why:
- it is super cheap!
- very filling
- you can grind it into flour which is WAY healthier than white flour- lots of protein!
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Red Wheat
This is the type of wheat most people think of. It’s a reddish-brownish color, and has a distinct “wheat” flavor. All of the wheat bread you see which is more brown, that’s made from red wheat. Red wheat has more of a bitter and strong taste to it. If you use it with cooking, you’ll want to add more sugar to the recipe to cover the distinct wheat taste. Red wheat is heavier and also has more acidity which makes it difficult for digestion.
White Wheat
This is a “newer” type of wheat. It has a more white/golden color to it. If you use this type of wheat to make breads and pastries, most people wouldn’t even know. White wheat is a lighter grain which makes it easier to digest. Cooking with it, you can swap it in place of white flour and it works great with hardly any wheat taste at all. Because of the lightness of grain, you don’t need as much sugar when cooking with it.
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In Conclusion
When looking at the difference between red vs white wheat, we prefer white wheat over here. I like it because of the softer wheat flavor, and that it doesn’t add a brown color to my bread. Since we have gotten a lot of red and white wheat given to us, we use the oldest first with our cooking. If you have a hard time digesting wheat, definitely try the white one, but if you come across some bargain priced red wheat, that works just as well too!
Which type of wheat do you prefer? Comment below
Further Reading:
Powdered vs Instant Powdered Milk
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6 thoughts on “Red vs White Wheat: Which is better?”
There’s different red wheat. HRW, hard red winter with no sub classes. HRS, hard red spring, with sub classes; DNS, dark northern spring, NS, northern spring, and RS, red spring. Those sub classes are divided by the DHV, dark hard vitreous berries. There’s another white wheat, it’s called club. WHCB, white club. Wheat proteins will range from 7% to above 16%. There’s also something called the falling number, which is a reference to the bake-ability of the bread.
You are absolutely correct, thanks for sharing this more in-depth information.
I haven’t started making my own flour yet, but assume it would be cheaper, so I’m looking into it. And I’m fairly new the the bread making art. So I recently just bought some Kroger brand whole wheat and then was baffled when it look like all purpose and concerned when it said white on the top, but still said while grain wheat flour as the only ingredient. But then the other bag I got was traditional and I made tortillas with it last night and, oh my goodness, they were not good. They were crumbly, fragile, and stiff. I had so much trouble working with them. So this was such and informative and helpful article!
That’s great that you’re trying out more wheat flour. It does take time to learn to cook with it, but is so exciting when you’ve got it down right.
I absolutely LOVE red wheat
I love the flavor of it too. Any favorite recipes with it?