[Sca-cooks] Flour prices

[Johnna Holloway]

Wall Street Journal had a report today that bodes ill
for the bread bakers among us.
Those that follow the commodities market are aware that US grain
prices are up. This now includes wheat and that means flour will be 
going up..

"Over the past year, corn and soybean prices hit records. Now, wheat 
prices are on a tear. On the Minneapolis Grain Exchange, hard red spring 
wheat closed at $17.63 a bushel yesterday, up from $4.92 a year earlier. 
In the cash markets, some farmers are fetching more than $20 a bushel. 
Many farmers are sitting on their grain, waiting for the price to go 
even higher, exacerbating the jump in prices.

Wheat prices have risen so swiftly that bakers can't adjust their prices 
fast enough to offset the impact, said Len Amoroso, executive vice 
president of Amoroso's Baking Co. in Philadelphia. "We are talking about 
prices that are just unheard of," he said. Tuesday, Mr. Amoroso said, he 
was quoted $48 per 100 pounds of flour from hard red spring wheat, which 
he uses to make sandwich rolls and other products. A year ago, he paid 
about $14.60."

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120295409138967129.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Johnnae