If cream of wheat cereal has turned up in a recipe or caught your eye at the store, here's what you need to use it with confidence and how to choose it, cook it, store it, what to substitute, and 17 recipes to try it in.

What is cream of wheat cereal?

Cream of Wheat is the most familiar brand name for farina, a hot breakfast cereal ground from the inner part of wheat kernels, the endosperm. Cooked with water or milk, it turns into a smooth, mild, slightly sweet porridge with almost no graininess once it swells.

It is finer and softer than two cousins it often gets confused with. Grits are made from corn. Semolina comes from hard durum wheat ground coarser, so it cooks up chewier.

Cream of Wheat sits at the gentle end: pale and creamy, quick to thicken. That smooth-thickening quality is why it shows up in far more than the breakfast bowl, from dumplings and cakes to a crisp coating for the pan.

Cooking With Cream of Wheat

For porridge, whisk it slowly into simmering liquid so it never clumps, then stir for the few minutes it takes to thicken. The classic ratio is about 3 to 4 parts liquid to 1 part cereal, looser for a pourable bowl, tighter for something that sets.

Use that thickening power in baking too. Cream of Wheat Pancakes fold it into the batter for a tender, custardy crumb. Cream of Wheat Bread uses it for a soft, close texture with a faint sweetness.

Heated with milk and sugar, the cereal sets firm enough to slice. That is the backbone of semolina-style desserts here like Namurrah and the coconut-rich Kushli, where it firms into a sliceable cake or pudding.

It binds, as well. A spoonful stiffens dumpling dough so it holds in simmering water, the trick behind the Austrian apricot dumplings Marillen Knoedel. In the savory Indian breakfast Upma, the toasted grains stay separate and fluffy instead of melting into mush.

Pairing and Common Mistakes

Sweet, the cereal takes warm flavors well: cinnamon, vanilla, brown sugar, honey, maple, butter, and fresh or dried fruit. Savory, it loves the route Upma takes, with mustard seed and curry leaf, onion and green chili. A pinch of salt in the cooking water sharpens either direction.

The number one mistake is lumps. They form when you dump the cereal into hot liquid all at once. Stream it in while whisking, or stir it into cold liquid first and then heat, and the porridge stays silky.

The second mistake is walking away. Farina thickens fast and scorches on the bottom of the pot if it sits, so keep it moving and pull it off the heat the moment it coats the spoon.

One more thing to remember: it firms up further as it cools. Stop a touch looser than you want it.

Substitutes

The closest swap is semolina, since it is the same idea ground coarser. It works nearly one for one in porridge and in cakes, just with a little more bite. Fine cornmeal or polenta gives comparable thickening for a savory porridge, though the flavor turns toward corn.

For a plain hot breakfast, quick grits or even instant oats fill the bowl. The texture shifts toward corn or oat rather than smooth wheat.

In baking where farina mostly adds structure, an equal measure of all-purpose flour can stand in, accepting a denser, less tender crumb. None of these are gluten-free, and neither is Cream of Wheat itself.

Buying and Storage

You will find it boxed with the hot cereals, in regular, quick, and instant grinds. Regular and quick behave the same in recipes. Instant is precooked and finer, so it can turn gummy in baking and is best kept for the breakfast bowl.

Generic farina is the same product at a lower price.

Like any milled wheat, it holds faint oils in the germ and will eventually go stale or rancid. Store the box tightly closed in a cool, dry cupboard, where it stays good for about a year.

For longer storage, or in a humid kitchen, move it to an airtight jar; the freezer extends it well past that. Give it a sniff before using an old box, since a sharp or musty smell means it is past its prime.

Quick facts

In Chinese

小麦谷物霜

British (UK) term

Cream of wheat cereal

en français

crème de céréales de blé

en español

crema de cereal de trigo

Recipes using cream of wheat cereal

There are 17 recipes that contain this ingredient.

All 17 recipes