TESTING, TESTING...Part 2

 Well, as promised, we tested our original wheat grinder.  This thing had no instruction manual and is so old that finding a manual on-line was fruitless.  We did our best and the first batch of flour had a very interesting color and flakes of brown in it.  Since we had learned from the first wheat grinder (more modern), one should throw away the first batch of ground wheat as it is used to "clean out" the grinding mechanism parts of any unwanted machining debris. We threw it out, but still had no idea why it was flaky with chunks of wheat berries mixed in... Turns out there was a piece of cushioning cardboard between the grinding stones from shipping. (face palm,  I told you it was un-used, un-opened even!)

After a thorough going through, we re-assembled the unit and proceeded to grind a real throw-away batch. It was smaller, so we could get right on the real deal.   Who knew that the Bosch that made a gazillion batches of cookie dough for me in my early married years, would come to grind wheat in my old age.  But, it did!  Once again, my neighbor got a good size bag of freshly ground wheat flour and I gladly shared it.

In all the excitement of grinding wheat and trying out different methods of sifting etc.  My spouse decided that sifting flour in a hand sieve was great for the end of the world and it's electricity, he was not about to sift pounds and pounds of ground wheat by hand.  When I served at the Kaysville Mill, I often cleaned in the "sifting room" and had witnessed first hand the process that the "Church Flour" goes through, the whole process is mind boggling and awesome and if you ever get the opportunity to tour the Mill, let alone serve there; I highly recommend it!

My spouse ordered what he thought would be a small electric sifting machine that would make the sifting process not so laborious.  Well, It did sift amazingly well.  Problem is/was... not a dainty little sifter that he was expecting.  We've named her "DOROTHY" and might just strap her in the back of the pick-up and parade her through the Midwest later.   But wow, did she sift that wheat very well.  

We will make sure to set aside 2 days next time we grind wheat.  One for grinding and sifting, and one for cleaning up the fine dust left behind.  All in all, a good thing - but we have learned what we set out to learn.  (Dorothy is up for "rent" if you feel so inclined.)  All is well, and happy future grinding!