My Newfound Love of Wheat

I have enjoyed making bread off and on for the past few years.

I felt like it was healthier and cheaper than store bought bread and it made me happy to be able to provide my family with nourishing food.

Although I knew there was such a thing as grinding your own wheat, that really meant nothing to me.

I kneaded the dough by hand and baked it in loaf pans in my oven. It was an all day process... due to rising and baking.

A few friends at Bible study talked about a store in Woodstock called Bread Beckers and that got me curious about learning more about grinding wheat and starting that process at my house.

One day this summer, my BFF from Bible study contacted me to tell me she was selling her Zojrushi bread maker and her Wondermill bread mill. She wanted to know if I was still interested in getting started.

Although I hadn't ever started the process of learning more about grinding my own wheat, I felt like it was too good of a deal to pass up and jumped in with both feet.

She gave me some basic ingredients to get started immediately and then I visited Bread Becker's the following week and stocked up on everything I would need.

I love Bread Becker's because they are christian owned and operated and apply biblical truths to what they teach and present.

I am definitely still learning and I so enjoy what I discover about the benefits of grinding my own wheat at home and I love being able to dump all the ingredients in the bread maker and leave!

Sue Becker states on her rebuttal of the famous book, Wheat Belly: "God created and gave us food to perfectly nourish our bodies.  He knows how our bodies work and what nutrients are needed for good health.  He made food to give us those nutrients.  When we alter God’s design and plan, we discredit His wisdom and we will suffer the consequences.

I have great concerns when diets eliminate entire food groups, especially ones that God has declared as good for food.
“But the Holy Spirit declares that in the latter times some will turn away from the faith, giving attention to deluding and seducing spirits and doctrines that demons teach…who teach people to abstain from certain kinds of foods which God created to be received with thanksgiving by those who believe and have an increasingly clear knowledge of the truth.” I Timothy 4:1,3 (AMP version)"

I highly encourage you to read that article as it is VERY interesting and informative.

So, why are real and freshly-milled grains so important?

1) Of the 44 nutrients most essential to your body, wheat contains 40 of them.

2) Whole grains and beans are the richest food sources of Vitamin E, which is literally needed by every cell in your body.

3) Real whole grains and breads made from freshly milled flour, with no added gluten and white sugar, have a very low glycemic index.

4) Once milled, real whole grain flour begins to oxidize rapidly, promoting spoilage and rancidity, greatly diminishing the nutrient content. Milling as you need it is the key to maximizing the health benefits of whole grains.


I hear of so many people who are against breads and wheat in general. I have to say, I am against store bought breads, grains, and flour. I DEFINITELY think that your intake of that should be reduced. There is really no nutritional benefits to them. I am not against, at all, limiting a nutritious product that God created in its entirety to meet the nutritional NEEDS we have.

Sue also had an article with truths she has found through extensive research.

I also highly encourage you to get this FREE cd that Sue offers. Here she breaks down so much of the scientific mumbo jumbo. If you would rather read it, go here. Although I think this is a condensed version and you miss out on a lot of the good parts.

I find all this so intriguing!!! I could sit and listen to this topic or read up on it for hours.

Here is a little history lesson Sue gives:


"What a blessing to know, that the eye of the one who created us is on us and this very one who created us, created the whole universe. This very God caused the earth to bring forth the vegetation he knew would best nourish and benefit our bodies and He gave to man "every plant yielding seed and every tree with seed in its fruit to have for food".(Genesis 1:29) After the flood of Noah's day, His provision for man included "every moving thing that lives" (Genesis 9:3) as well as the green vegetables and plants. I trust God completely in His provisions to know what foods will best nourish our bodies. Man, however, has altered His provisions first for the sake of convenience and now greed.
Look with me for a moment at the example of the children of Israel in the wilderness. With nothing to eat, God lovingly provided them with manna from heaven. It was to be gathered daily. Some tried to gather tomorrow's portion today. But God says six days you shall work and one day shall you rest. On every day but the Sabbath, God caused the manna that was gathered for tomorrow to get worms in it. The manna had to be gathered everyday before the sun came up. I'm sure if some enterprising Israelite could have discovered a way to keep the manna from spoiling, to allow it to be stored for several days, he would have had a very marketable product, especially to those who were simply too lazy or too busy doing other things to get their food every day. This is exactly what we see if we look more closely at the foods offered in the grocery store today and how they got there.
Prior to the 1900's most flour was milled locally and the bread baked at home. God designed the wheat kernel, as well as other grains, to perfectly store the nutrients within. Once broken open, as in milling, the nutrients immediately begin to oxidize. Within about 72 hours, 90% of over 30 nutrients are virtually gone due to oxidation. Also since the germ oil causes the flour to turn rancid very quickly, only enough grain was ground fresh each day to meet the needs of the community. This meant that just about every family was "gathering" their manna daily. However, in the 1920's new technology allowed enterprising millers to separate the wheat components. By removing the germ, germ oil, and the bran, the remaining white flour could be stored indefinitely. This began to eliminate the need for local milling and people began to relinquish their own responsibility of preparing their bread daily.
Lucrative markets were also found for the nutritious "by-products" of this new milling process. The bran and wheat germ were sold as high protein food supplements for cattle. Local mills soon went out of business as the large roller mills produced huge volumes of long lasting white flour.
This appeared to be a great advance in technology. In just a short time, however, cases of beriberi and pellagra began to drastically increase. Both of these diseases are the result of vitamin B deficiencies and health officials traced the problem to the new white flour. The new milling process strips the B vitamins as well as about 24 other nutrients from the wheat kernels.
Health officials urged mills to return to producing whole wheat flour again but they did not want to lose their very profitable market of selling the germ and bran as cattle feed. Instead, millers chose to "enrich" the white flour by replacing 4 vitamins for the 25-30 that are removed. This solved the problem of beriberi and pellagra, however, we are now plagued with many diseases that are directly related to our consumption of white flour (appendicitis, diverticular disease, hiatal hernia, heart disease, diabetes, obesity and more!).
Knowing this information we were convicted to purchase an in-home grain mill and to begin making all of our own bread from fresh milled grains. The health benefits were immediate. We felt more energetic, constipation was totally relieved for me and our cravings for sugar were greatly reduced. This enabled us to virtually eliminate white sugar from our home, consequently we have seen much less sickness. "


The How and Why of Freshly Ground Grains---

All grains come in their own divinely designed preservation packaging, the bran. This exterior shell of the grain is made up of many nutrient rich layers. More importantly, it protects and preserves the vital nutrients stored in the grain—almost indefinitely! From Biblical accounts, we know Joseph stored grain for up to fourteen years—enough to feed the entire nation of Egypt during seven years of famine! It has even been said that grain found in the pyramids, buried with ancient rulers such as King Tut, has been found to be viable even thousands of years later.
Once the bran has been damaged or cracked open, the inner elements are exposed to oxygen, which destroys the vitamins and oils in just a short period of time. Within twenty-four hours of grinding or cracking wheat, forty percent of the nutrients have oxidized. Within seventy-two hours of processing (just three days), ninety percent of the nutrients have been destroyed. From this point on, the flour still maintains its mineral content and (of course) its caloric value, but the life-giving vitamins and oils have been essentially destroyed—over twenty-five of them! By immediately using the freshly processed flour or grain, you are consuming and reaping the health and flavor benefits of these essential vitamins and oils.
The bran, however, is more than just fancy packaging. It is rich in vitamins, minerals and proteins. Further, it is a great source of valuable fiber, which acts like a sponge, absorbing and removing toxins from the body as it “scrubs” the digestive tract. Regular intake of fresh, whole grains eliminates the need for dietary fiber supplements.
Just inside the bran is the endosperm, a white starchy substance with a low level of nutrients. This is the “white flour” that makes up most of the baked goods and grain products sold in the stores today. Buried deep within the center of the endosperm is the most vital part, the germ. Although the germ is the smallest of these three components comprising only 2½ percent of the entire kernel, it contains a high concentration of some of the most valuable, all-natural nutrients. The wheat germ contains tocopherol, God’s version of Vitamin E oil, which some claim to be the “oil of youth,” keeping skin and other vital organs soft and pliable. Researchers have found tocopherol to be a crucial element to a healthy reproductive system (as indicated by its very name: tokos is Greek for offspring + pherin means to bear). The germ also contains a rich supply of all the essential fatty acids.
What is true for wheat is also true for other grains, such as corn, rice and oats.

We use Hard Read Wheat and Hard WhiteWheat (equal ratios) when making bread. I use Soft White Wheat when making things like cookies, cakes, pancakes, tortillas, etc.

 I buy a big 5 gallon bucket of Hard Red and Hard White because I make bread a minimum of once a week... I am generally making other things to eat as well. This is my smaller bucket I keep it in so I don't always have to open the big bucket.

Sorry for lots of history and info in this post. If you are truly looking for the healthiest option for your family, I would encourage you to research the the authenticity of this and find out for yourself the health benefits of grinding your own flour.

Grinding our own flour has led us to no longer use refined or bleached sugars. We use honey granules for white sugar and sucanat for brown sugar. Sucanat is pure dried sugar cane juice. Honey Granules are a unique sweetener that are made from a combination of unrefined sugar cane juice (Sucanat) and a bit of honey in order to lighten the color and texture of the final product. The best place to source Honey Granules is from Bread Beckers, who ships all over the US. I buy the convenient 5lb pail. I find Honey Granules to be the most accurate 1:1 natural sweetener swap for white sugar. The color of the final product will be more rustic, resulting in a cream/egg-shell rather than a pure white Unlike common white sugar, Sucanat is unrefined and therefore contains the molasses mineral content typically lost in the refining process, resulting in a rustic and deep flavor. Aesthetically, Sucanat’s closest relative is brown sugar, for which a 1:1 substitution is commonplace; however, Sucanat is more granular, less moist and more nutritious. Brown sugar is typically common white sugar with just a bit of molasses added back.

I've made everything from sandwich bread, french bread, hamburger buns, muffins, Ezekiel bread, muffins, tortillas, pizza dough, biscuits, cookies, and more with my freshly ground flour and I LOVE it. The kids love it and my hubby loves it.

We love using freshly ground wheat and we don't plan to ever stop doing so!!