In each variety of grain there are several albuminoids occurring side by side, and almost every kind of grain seems to possess at least one albuminoid, perhaps several albu- minoids, by which it is distinguished from other varieties of grain. Wheat-flour made into a dough with water, placed in a canvas bag and kneaded, parts with its starch, and leaves gluten in the bag ; this is a plastic, tough mass, which can be drawn out like shoemaker’s pitch ; it imparts to wheat - flour dough that peculiar tenacity which it exhibits best in the manufacture of macaroni — without gluten no macaroni; it also imparts to dough that more gentle cohesion which enables it to retain the little bubbles of carbonic acid produced by fermentation, and helps their shape to be fixed by the baking process ; it is thus the prime agent in the production of that sponginess which makes bread so digestible and so suitable for the most varying impregnations. ALBUMINOIDS OF FLOUR 375 Gluten is itself a mixture of at least two albuminoids, four- fifths of it consisting of fibrin, one-fifth of glutin. Gluten has no taste, is translucent when free from water, and insoluble in spirit of wine ; but when it is extracted with this reagent, it yields to it the glutin, and the remains undissolved. The bulk of the soluble albuminoids of wheat and other flour consists of leguniin and albumin. The legumin has also been termed vegetable casein, as it has some properties in common with casein from cow’s milk (a cheese is actually manufactured from legumin of beans), but the name legumin is preferable, as it indicates the fact that it is the prevailing albuminoid of the seeds of the leguminosse, such as beans, peas, lupins, and others. The Imshs of ivheat obtained as bran contain another albuminoid {cerealin), soluble in water, precipitated by alcohol and acids. During the process of malting a portion of the albuminoids is consumed altogether, while another is transformed into bodies which have more power over starch than the original albuminoids, and as an aggregate have been termed diastase. Barley contains little gluten, and its flour yields a heavy, sticky dough ; the barley cakes of the Hebrides are some- times like leather. To become good bread, barley-flour requires an addition of wheat or rye flour. Bye-fioiir contains still less gluten, and therefore yields, with leaven, a heavy, close-grained bread of darkest colour, black bread, Schtuarz-brod or Pumpernickel of the North Germans ; its latest known English equivalent is York night bread, so called because it had to be baked during a whole night. Oatmeal and niaizemeal also have little cohesion in their dough, owing to the want of gluten, and hence yield very bad bread. Oatmeal, indeed, is hardly ever used for bread, but mainly in the form of mostly unfermented thin flat cakes. 376 THE SPIRIT OF COOKER) Bicemeal has, with the lowest amount of albuminoids, also the least dough - forming capacity; it is entirely aplastic.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

In each variety of grain there are several albuminoids occurring side by side, and almost every kind of grain seems to possess at least one albuminoid, perhaps several albuminoids, by which it is distinguished from other varieties of grain. Wheat-flour made into a dough with water, placed in a canvas bag and kneaded, parts with its starch, and leaves gluten in the bag ; this is a plastic, tough mass, which can be drawn out like shoemaker’s pitch ; it imparts to wheat - flour dough that peculiar tenacity which it exhibits best in the manufacture of macaroni—without gluten no macaroni; it also imparts to dough that more gentle cohesion which enables it to retain the little bubbles of carbonic acid produced by fermentation, and helps their shape to be fixed by the baking process; it is thus the prime agent in the production of that sponginess which makes bread so digestible and so suitable for the most varying impregnations. ALBUMINOIDS OF FLOUR Gluten is itself a mixture of at least two albuminoids, four-fifths of it consisting of fibrin, one-fifth of glutin. Gluten has no taste, is translucent when free from water, and insoluble in spirit of wine ; but when it is extracted with this reagent, it yields to it the glutin, and the remains undissolved. The bulk of the soluble albuminoids of wheat and other flour consists of leguniin and albumin. The legumin has also been termed vegetable casein, as it has some properties in common with casein from cow’s milk (a cheese is actually manufactured from legumin of beans), but the name legumin is preferable, as it indicates the fact that it is the prevailing albuminoid of the seeds of the leguminosse, such as beans, peas, lupins, and others. The husk of wheat obtained as bran contain another albuminoid {cerealin), soluble in water, precipitated by alcohol and acids. During the process of malting a portion of the albuminoids is consumed altogether, while another is transformed into bodies which have more power over starch than the original albuminoids, and as an aggregate have been termed diastase. Barley contains little gluten, and its flour yields a heavy, sticky dough ; the barley cakes of the Hebrides are sometimes like leather. To become good bread, barley-flour requires an addition of wheat or rye flour. Rye-flour contains still less gluten, and therefore yields, with leaven, a heavy, close-grained bread of darkest colour, black bread, Schtuarz-brod or Pumpernickel of the North Germans ; its latest known English equivalent is York night bread, so called because it had to be baked during a whole night. Oatmeal and niaizemeal also have little cohesion in their dough, owing to the want of gluten, and hence yield very bad bread. Oatmeal, indeed, is hardly ever used for bread, but mainly in the form of mostly unfermented thin flat cakes. Ricemeal has, with the lowest amount of albuminoids, also the least dough - forming capacity; it is entirely aplastic.

The spirit of cookery