The quality of spaghetti processed from two Canadian durum wheats (Triticum durum Desf.) and one Argentine durum wheat was evaluated in terms of flour characteristics at four stages of kernel development. Rapid changes in the nature of the flour components within each cultivar resulted in substantial improvement of spaghetti quality during development. Flour pigment levels decreased during development for all three cultivars which resulted in decreased spaghetti pigment levels. Flour brownness, which was related to spaghetti brownness decreased during development for all three cultivars. The brownness of the Argentine durum flour and spaghetti was much greater thaw that of the Canadian durums at al stages of development. Spaghetti cooking quality improved during development for all three durum wheats until the 6–10 days preripe stage. The cooking quality of spaghetti processed from 6–10 days preripe durum was essentially equal to the cooking quality of spaghetti prepared from the corresponding ripe durum. Solubility distributions of the flour proteins and gel filtration elution profiles of the flour proteins established a relationship between improved spaghetti cooking quality and an increased proportion of glutenins.
