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'Millhouse' kicks open door to health-boosting barley in bread market

Canadian researchers have developed a new type of barley that opens dramatic potential for the health-boosting grain in bread and other traditional milled wheat products.

"Millhouse," the first registered Canadian variety of this type, contains properties that allow barley grain to be processed in the same fashion as wheat. By mixing barley flour with wheat flour, millers can produce bread and other products with benefits such as double the percentage of dietary fibre and unique barley nutritional components linked to lowering blood cholesterol and preventing cancer.

"Millhouse is the first true milling barley for Canada," says barley breeder Dr. Mario Therrien of Agriculture and Agri-Food Canada's (AAFC) Brandon Research Centre, who bred Millhouse. "Millhouse is bred to complement wheat for milling purposes, with the advantage that it provides more dietary fibre than wheat could ever provide. It also provides all the other unique health benefits of barley."

This progress was supported directly by western Canadian barley growers through the Barley Check-off Fund, administered by Western Grains Research Foundation (WGRF). Seed for the variety is expected to be available in 2007, but as a pioneering variety it and other milling barley varieties to follow will require years of market testing before they are expected to comprise broad acreage.

"We have put Millhouse grain through some advanced pre-processing regimens, so we know it performs well," says Therrien. "So the focus now really shifts to marketing. It will likely take a while to make them comfortable with adding a new flour source to what they're used to. But we're confident the advantages will be recognized. Talking to some of the industry people in the know, it wouldn't be unreasonable to have food barley reach the acreage equivalent of durum at its peak in Western Canada."

Millhouse is the first variety in a second stream of western Canadian barley varieties bred for use in food products. The varieties in the first stream, developed by Dr. Brian Rossnagel and Dr. Ron Bhatty at the University of Saskatchewan Crop Development Centre, provided an important stepping stone to the AAFC Brandon work on Millhouse.

"We work closely with the U of S program on the food barley effort," says Therrien. "Over the next decade, our tentative plan is to compliment the food barley development effort. The U of S program will continue to focus on 'waxy' barley varieties, which have a starch profile designed to produce tortillas, taco chips and similar products. At Brandon, our focus will continue on non-waxy food barleys, such as Millhouse, which are targeted at the baked wheat product industry." Both programs are supported in part by farmers through the WGRF Barley Check-off Fund.

In the Millhouse effort, the key obstacle for Therrien and colleagues was overcoming barley's traditionally poor water-absorbing properties.

"What you need for a milling barley is a kind of starch that is similar to wheat in its water-absorbing properties. That's what we've aimed for with Millhouse," he explains. "This variety contains the right kind of starch and protein profile that is compatible with wheat. This allows the barley flour it produces to be blended with wheat flour, without creating any problems for the miller."

The idea is not to replace wheat flour altogether in the product, but to allow for these blends to be produced, he says. "The barley imparts the dietary fibre that the wheat lacks, along with barley's other unique health-enhancing benefits, so you get a better product."

In blends involving up to 40 percent barley flour, Therrrien estimates that millers could double the dietary fibre content from that of a conventional wheat loaf.

Research in recent years has also uncovered that barley grain contains high levels of beta-glucan, a type of fibre linked to reduce levels of blood cholesterol. Barley also contains several powerful antioxidants, most notably tocopherol, which is associated with reducing the risk of cancer.

More information on Millhouse, including a Q&A with Therrien, is available in the June edition of WGRF's Western Grains Research Magazine, available at www.westerngrains.com. The WGRF Barley Check-off Fund allocates approximately $600,000 annually to barley breeding programs.

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