Studies on the digestibility of the grain sorghums / [book]

C. F. Langworthy, Arthur Dunham Holmes
1916 unpublished
Monograph 2 BULLETIN" 470, U. S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. / r> IP vegetarian diets, and he believed accordingly that kaoliang was very incompletely utilized by the human system. In this country feterita, kafir, dwarf milo, and kaoliang are well-known varieties of the grain sorghums which have for some time been used primarily as feeding crops for animals, but which in some instances have formed a part of the human dietary. The people living in those sections of the country where the sorghums
more » ... ave been grown have long known that these grains are suitable for use as food, and the agricultural press has from time to time reported successful attempts to use them for this purpose. Moreover, following the introduction of the sorghums into the agriculture of the United States, commercial attempts have been made to interest the public in these grains for bread making and similar uses. Numerous tests of these grains have been made to detennine their composition and nutritive value as a feeding crop for animals and, in some instances, to learn how they may best be prepared for human consumption. Many baking tests, for example, have been made with the meal of kafir, which is perhaps the best known of the sorghums, to determine whether it can be used more advantageously alone or mixed with some other meal in ordinary baking practices. The Department of Agriculture 1 has studied the preparation and uses of kafir meal, reporting a number of recipes for incorporating it in such common foods as bread, doughnuts, cookies, etc. A series of baking tests described by Dillon 2 indicates that kafir meal in admixture with wheat flour in the proportion of 1 to 1, 1 to 2, or 2 to 1, makes a very satisfactory bread. Francis 3 reports analyses comparing the composition and food value of feterita, Indian corn, kafir, and wheat, and gives recipes for the preparation of bread and similar products, using part feterita meal and part wheat flour. He concludes that feterita resembles corn in composition, having a nutritive value of about 90 per cent of that of corn, and suggests, moreover, that feterita, being somewhat softer than kafir, should be more thoroughly digested. General information and a number of tested recipes compiled from various sources are given by Davis 4 regarding the value of kafir, feterita, and milo as cereal foods. Summers 5 reports comparative analyses of feterita and wheat together with the results of a series of baking tests. He found that the best bread, pancakes, or gems, could be made by using 50 per cent of feterita meal and 50 per cent of wheat flour. Similar studies of kaoliang are reported by Fromme 6 , who used kaoliang meal in place of kafir meal in the recipes reported by the Office of Home Economics.
doi:10.5962/bhl.title.108306 fatcat:s37qlwco25e6vjhv4hfcnqd2t4