flour

Definition

Powder obtained by grinding or milling cereal grains, especially wheat, or other foodstuffs such as soybeans and potatoes, and used to bake bread, cakes, and pastry.

Etymology

Spelled (until about 1830) and meaning flower in the sense of flour being the "finest portion of ground grain" (compare French fleur de farine, fine fleur). Doublet of fleur, flor, and flower. Partially displaced native meal. The U.S. standard of identity comes from 21CFR137.105.

Example Sentences

• "Everything a living animal could do to destroy and to desecrate bed and walls had been done. […] A canister of flour from the kitchen had been thrown at the looking-glass and lay like trampled snow over the remains of a decent blue suit with the lining ripped out which lay on top of the ruin of a plastic wardrobe."
• "mustard flour"
• "that nobody is wished to see my dead body. & that no murnurs walk behind me at my funeral. & that no flours be planted on my grave."

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