Issue 32
November/
December 2000

Prairie Grains is the official publication of the Minnesota Association of Wheat Growers, North Dakota Grain Growers Association, South Dakota Wheat, Inc. and the Minnesota Barley Growers Assocation.

Copyright Prairie
Grains Magazine
November/
December 2000

Wheat Foods News

Good news on flour disappearance
The U.S. Bureau of Census has revised the 1999 domestic consumption of flour to 402,087,000 cwts, up from 393,856,000 from earlier figures. This brings per capita estimates to 147 pounds per year—up 1 pound from 1998, but still 3 pounds below the 1997 record figure.

Focus groups help refine grain messages
In order to refine its communication messages, the Wheat Foods Council held four focus groups in Overland Park, KS (suburb of Kansas City) and Boston, MA in September. These two markets were chosen because Kansas City has high fad diet book sales while Bostonians perceive themselves to be very nutrition-savvy. The WFC periodically tests its messages about the role of grains in proper nutrition, because it is essential these messages are appealing to the WFC target audience: Women ages 25-54 who are the primary household shopper.

How good bread is made, from field to baker
There are key steps in the bread-making process — from finding new wheat varieties that produce high yields for farmers to milling the right flour to helping customers bake the best bread. Writer Rachel Post recently followed the making of a loaf of bread, from seed to oven, starting at Cargill's Goertzen Seed Research Lab, Haven, Kan., to a Cargill flour mill in Ogden, Utah, to the test kitchen of a top customer - Pepperidge Farm. "I learned a great deal about what makes a good grain of wheat, as defined by scientists, farmers, millers, bakers and consumers," she writes. "And as a consumer myself (who got to eat lots of good bread while doing this story), I challenge: Is there a more perfect food?" Her article can be found online: www. cargill.com/today/00_05_bread.htm

Wheat Foods Council programs and activities are funded in part by the Minnesota Wheat Checkoff, managed by the Minnesota Wheat Council.