grinding your own wheaties

(Just kidding. Man, I wish I could grind my own wheaties. We'd save a bundle on frosted mini wheats. Tyler eats a huge bag of generic frosted mini spooners in a week or two. Not kidding.)

This weekend I ground my own wheat. (Look, Ma! I'm so domestic!) Mom and Dad bought us a wheat grinder a couple of Christmases ago. I was terrified of it at first because it's so noisy, but it's the easiest thing ever to do. Plug it in and pour in the wheat kernels. Easy peasy. I like to grind it outside so it's not as loud on Jack's ears.

We bought our wheat at Costco. It comes in a giant tub. My neighbor Jess came over (no doubt wondering where all that loud noise was coming from) and said, "Ooooooooooohhhhhh! I didn't know what you were supposed to do with the kernels! I always wondered how they turned into flour." Yep, you grind them.

My grinder has settings from coarse to fine. I choose semi-fine. I have found when I grind my own whole wheat we 1) save money and 2) can use it in place of white flour. I just substitute the whole wheat flour in directly for the white all-purpose flour. I used buy whole wheat flour from the store because I was lazy and didn't have a wheat grinder, but the store-bought flour was dense and heavy. It made any recipe I tried taste terrible. With freshly-ground wheat flour I can replace the white flour with whole wheat and it's still light and fluffy. Problem solved!