Grocers' Goods / A Family Guide to the Purchase of Flour, Sugar, Tea, Coffee, Spices, Canned Goods, Cigars, Wines, and All Other Articles Usually Found in American Grocery Stores

by Frederick B. Goddard

Points for Purchasers of Flour.

As starch is whiter than gluten, whiteness is therefore really no indication of the sweetness and strength of flour; and, although flour becomes whiter with age and will take up more water and make a whiter loaf, many prefer freshly ground flour for family use, as being better in flavor, while others claim that flour will “work better” if kept for some time after grinding.

The brand or word “Patent” on packages of flour has come to signify, not that the flour is really patented, but that it is or should be finest quality. Fancy brands may mean little; they are put on at the whim of the maker. Flour is rarely adulterated at present, but good and poor grades are sometimes mixed. Inferior grades of flour are largely exported, while the best are mainly used at home. Graham flour is ground wheat from which the bran has not been removed.

Flour is put up in barrels of one hundred and ninety-six pounds net weight, and in muslin sacks of various weights. Families everywhere invariably want “the best,” and dealers often adopt the excellent plan of buying quantities of some very choice and tried grade of flour and selling it in convenient sized packages for family trade, under their own brand and guarantee.