Does Wheat need to be malted?

I have a chance to buy some red wheat off an organic farmer locally. Was wondering if this wheat needs to be malted. Can I just mill it and mix into my receipts that call for red wheat. Never read up on wheat much.

It depends on what you want out of your wheat and whether you have enough enzymes to convert unmalted wheat. You might look at Beer Advocate's Malt and Adjunct Guide or BYO's Grains and Adjuncts Chart (unmalted wheat = flaked wheat).

I think if it's not flaked, you'd need to do a cereal mash first. Flaked wheat is not necessarily the same as unmalted wheat, as they process it through hot rollers to flake it the starches gelatinize.

Flaked wheat is definitely NOT raw wheat. Flaked wheat has been pre-gelatinized by running them wet through hot rollers. Unmalted wheat also goes by the name of raw wheat. Raw wheat gelatinizes between 130F and 150F so you can use it straight in a mash just like you would malted wheat (no cereal mash required), although it contains no enzymes of its own, so you must use a large proportion of diastatic malts like 2-row or pilsner. Many Witbiers are 40-50% raw unmalted wheat.

They're not all exactly interchangeable, as they'll give different contributions to flavor and mouthfeel. Raw wheat also contributes a bit more haze than malted wheat does.