This cereal is a particularly good choice. Rich in protein, magnesium and carotene, it also has a relatively low glycaemic index. So, if you want to process maize on your farm or on your holding, here’s how to go about it!
Why make cornflour?
Maize flour is an interesting flour, widely used in gluten-free baking. It is even one of the most widely used for this type of cooking, as it has a neutral, slightly sweet flavour. Its yellow hues give a lovely golden colour to pastries.
And that’s not all! Cornflour is perfect for making biscuits, pancakes and sweet cakes, but it can also be used to make savoury dishes. You can even make your own gluten-free bread with cornflour!
To add lightness and fluffiness to your creations, it may be useful to supplement the cornflour with starch.
If you’re looking for more rustic, authentic flavours, combine maize flour with buckwheat flour or chestnut flour, which will give your confections pretty brown colours that your customers will love!
Drying and storing maize
To turn maize into flour successfully, the grain must first of all be well stored. Drying the maize is the step you can’t do without.
Because well-dried maize is maize that processes better!
To avoid clogging the professional mill you choose, the maize grain must be sufficiently dry. That way, you’ll get optimum yield and a quality grind!
The Astrié maize grinder for easy unrolling
The Astrié mill is one of the best ways of turning maize into flour while retaining all its nutritional properties.
In fact, as we saw above, one of the many advantages of cornflour is that it contains no gluten, which could be a solution for some of your customers. What’s more, since it offers exceptional nutritional qualities, it should find its place in pastries, bread-making and traditional bakery products. And with good reason: it contains 2 to 3 times more B vitamins than most fresh vegetables!
White flour, which is oxidised and therefore devoid of nutritional qualities, is increasingly being discarded. The Astrié mill is ideally placed to create a traditional corn flour that retains all its properties.
The principle is simple: the seed is no longer crushed between the two millstones, it is completely unrolled. Micrometrically adjusting the gap between the two millstones produces a nutritious, home-grown corn flour!
But if this professional flour mill is best placed to turn maize into flour, it’s also because it’s a traditional mill: perfectly cut, the millstones are made from Sidobre granite. It’s this firmness that means the millstone no longer crushes the grain, but actually unwinds it to preserve all its properties.
The result is a gluten-free corn flour rich in nutrients, vitamins, minerals and proteins!
Choosing the right Astrié mill for maize processing
As we said above: to make quality flour, your mill must be made from Sidobre granite. But that’s not all, and you need to be vigilant when it comes to making your Astrié mill! There are many manufacturers on the market who claim to make mills of this type, but don’t respect the basic principles.
To be sure you’re dealing with an Astrié mill, concentrate on the grinding wheel: its size and oscillating system allow a slow rotation speed, otherwise you’ll have trouble producing quality maize flour.
Finally, when it comes to the sieve, the manufacturer must also do a precise job: the sieve removes the stresses from the milling process, which sometimes lead to condensation and clogging. The result: higher yields and consistently better product quality!
When it comes to turning maize into flour, the Astrié type mill is a firm favourite with professionals. And since it can also produce spelt flour, soft wheat flour, chestnut flour or rye flour, you can offer consumers a product of unrivalled quality! So, are you ready to give it a try?
