Modern wheat
Durum Wheat
Triticum turgidum subsp. durum
Tetraploid (AABB) — pasta's grain since Rome
In the atlas
Durum is not bread wheat. It never picked up the D genome, so its gluten is strong but inextensible — perfect for a noodle that should snap, not balloon. Romans knew it; North Dakota still ranks as a durum capital. Mill it coarse and you have semolina. Mill it fine and you have pasta flour that also makes a golden hearth loaf.
Origin. Fertile Crescent; now North Dakota, Italy, Canada, the Maghreb
Flavor. Buttery, sunny, faintly sweet corn.
Worth knowing
- The hardest common wheat — 'durum' is Latin for hard.
- Carotenoids (lutein) make the flour egg-yolk gold without eggs.
- High protein, but the gluten network is 'short' — poor oven spring alone.
- Blend 20–30% into bread wheat for color and chew.
Flours you can make
| Flour | Extraction | Protein | Gluten | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Whole-grain flour | 100% | 14% | 11.2% | Everything the berry holds — bran, germ, and endosperm. Mill 1:1 by weight. Use within days, or freeze. |
| High-extraction (85%) | 85% | 13.7% | 11.5% | Sift once through a #30–#40 sieve. Keeps most flavor and minerals, slightly stronger dough than 100%. |
| Bolted bread-flour style | 75% | 13.4% | 11.9% | Second sifting (#50–#60). Lighter crumb, longer shelf life, less fiber. Bran left behind is gold in porridge. |
| Semolina (coarse) | 80% | 13.2% | 11% | Gritty, golden, the classic pasta grind. Stop after the first coarse pass. |
Nutrition / 100 g
- Calories
- 339 kcal
- Protein
- 14 g
- Carbs
- 71 g
- Fiber
- 9.6 g
- Fat
- 2.5 g
- Iron
- 3.5 mg
- Magnesium
- 144 mg
- Zinc
- 4.2 mg
- Thiamin
- 0.42 mg
- Selenium
- 89 µg
Typical whole-grain flour / 100 g.
Sources & USDA linksBuy it retail
- Breadtopia
- Pleasant Hill Grain
- Azure Standard
- Central Milling
- Bob's Red Mill (berries & semolina)
- Janie's Mill
Availability rotates by harvest. Search the berry name plus “food grade.”
Mill Durum Wheat now
Miller’s desk
Grain to flour
Vital wheat gluten booster
Most bags of vital wheat gluten are 75–80% protein. The booster is added on top of the flour, not swapped in.
Whole-grain flour · Moderate gluten
- Whole grain needed
- 505 g
- Flour you’ll get
- 500 g
- Bran left behind
- 0 g
- Protein in that flour
- 70 g · 14%
- Natural gluten
- 11.2%
- Add VWG
- None needed
- After VWG
- 14% protein · 11.2% gluten
About 2.6 cups of berries → 3.8 cups of whole-grain flour. Whole-grain milling is essentially 1:1 by weight; sifting is where you lose bran.
How to mill it
Two-pass milling keeps the grit that pasta loves.
Coarse first for semolina; a second pass for fine pasta flour.
Tempering: Helpful. 14.5% moisture overnight.
Everything the berry holds — bran, germ, and endosperm. Mill 1:1 by weight. Use within days, or freeze.
Milling 101 →Next: bake it
Pick a loaf for this flour
14% protein after VWG · Durum Wheat whole-grain flour. Sandwich loaf, focaccia, sourdough — the kitchen will scale dough, hydration, and times to this mix.
