Wheat from Another Time
There's a very pleasant story about a variety of wheat now called Kamut. During the second world war, the story goes, a serviceman was sold a pinch of grain said to have been taken from King Tut's tomb. He gave it to a farmer buddy who sent it home to his father. It was 36 grains. He planted them and 32 of them grew. From that start over a six year period he propogated the seeds into 1500 lbs of grain. No one had any interest in it until someone in the 70's heard the story and got hold of a pint jar of the wheat which is grown and sold commercially today.
Many botanists scoff at the story of 5000 year old wheat sprouting and have suggested alternate explainations such as some middle eastern farmers had been growing this rare type of wheat from antiquity until the 1940's when the airman rescued it from oblivion. But it makes me wonder. The species of wheat was unknown to modern botany until its supposed extraction from the Egyptian tomb and it is very different from modern wheat.
I'm not so quick to dismiss the story. Recently the pits of an extinct type of date palm was found in an archeological dig near Jerusalem and carbon dating confirmed that it was over 2000 years old. The archeologist planted one of the pits and it has grown into a palm tree! Likewise 3000 year old lotus seeds from Egyptian tombs have produced plants. I am also personally familiar with the story of some spelunkers near here who found a clay pot, sealed up in clay, in a cave. The pot dated from the pre-Cherokee era so it was at least 1500 years old and more likely around 3000. It contained corn and the spelunker, also being a farmer, planted a little of it and it grew. It was brown popcorn, what would be expected from that time of the corn culture, in tiny ears about the size of your thumb.
So I'm not so quick to dismiss the Kamut story.
At any rate, if wheat doesn't sprout after 5000 years, even the hardest cynic admits that it stays viable for 30 years. And if it is viable, if it will sprout, it is nutrive as well.
You can buy all the grains and dried legumes you want and they will be good to eat after many, many years so long as you protect them from their two enemies: moisture and insects. Alas, the insects that attack them do not need any moisture so you have to address the two problems separately.
But what about all that stuff we heard during the Y2K debacle about wheat sealed in metal drums sealed with nitrogen? Hype. The sort of thing that someone who would fall for the Y2K thing would have fallen for.
Keep the grains and legumes dry, put them in airtight glass jars, lock down barrels, or sealable (even ZipLoc type) plastic bags. Then if there is a possibility that they contain insect eggs, especially weavils, freeze the jars or bags for two days, let them thaw for a week, then freeze them for two more days. This kills any adult insects, allows the eggs to germinate after the cold layering, and then kills any eggs that hatch. Now your staples are good for decades.
You can't do this with four or meal. The grain's longevity depends on its ingenious seedcoat. Once that seedcoat is broken by grinding, the oils begin to rancify. That is why the germ, the most nutrive part, of all grains is removed before they are ground into flour or meal, otherwise the flour would rancify, sour, on the store shelf. Commercial meals and flours, already devoid of nutrients, have a short shelf life and lose what nutrition they have rather quickly.
Whole grain wheat and corn are just as they came from the plant. Rice, barley, oats, and buckwheat have a husk over the groat that is mechanically removed before they are consumed. Those grains are bought as hulled and are still whole grain. You do not want the 'pearled' or 'polished' variety of them because both the protection of the groat and its nutrients have been compromised. In the case of rice, a very little of the oil is disturbed in the hulling process and this oil will give whole brown rice a sort of rancid smell when you first open a closed container of it. It's harmless and in no wise indicates compromised rice.
Keep the grains whole until just before you use them. The only exception to this I'd recommend considering is the case of 'steel cut oats.' The hulled groats have been run through steel knife edges and cut into three or four pieces. This is the so called 'pinhead oats' what is sold for a fortune as genuine Irish oatmeal. Quaker oats and such have been steamed and then flatteded and dehydrated. Not a bad food all in all but far inferior to real oatmeal.
Whole beans, peas, and lentils don't store anywhere as long as wheat or corn, but they probably outlive us anyway. Treat them and store them exactly like the grains.
It is not necessary to freeze whole grains or beans to extend their shelf life.
Many botanists scoff at the story of 5000 year old wheat sprouting and have suggested alternate explainations such as some middle eastern farmers had been growing this rare type of wheat from antiquity until the 1940's when the airman rescued it from oblivion. But it makes me wonder. The species of wheat was unknown to modern botany until its supposed extraction from the Egyptian tomb and it is very different from modern wheat.
I'm not so quick to dismiss the story. Recently the pits of an extinct type of date palm was found in an archeological dig near Jerusalem and carbon dating confirmed that it was over 2000 years old. The archeologist planted one of the pits and it has grown into a palm tree! Likewise 3000 year old lotus seeds from Egyptian tombs have produced plants. I am also personally familiar with the story of some spelunkers near here who found a clay pot, sealed up in clay, in a cave. The pot dated from the pre-Cherokee era so it was at least 1500 years old and more likely around 3000. It contained corn and the spelunker, also being a farmer, planted a little of it and it grew. It was brown popcorn, what would be expected from that time of the corn culture, in tiny ears about the size of your thumb.
So I'm not so quick to dismiss the Kamut story.
At any rate, if wheat doesn't sprout after 5000 years, even the hardest cynic admits that it stays viable for 30 years. And if it is viable, if it will sprout, it is nutrive as well.
You can buy all the grains and dried legumes you want and they will be good to eat after many, many years so long as you protect them from their two enemies: moisture and insects. Alas, the insects that attack them do not need any moisture so you have to address the two problems separately.
But what about all that stuff we heard during the Y2K debacle about wheat sealed in metal drums sealed with nitrogen? Hype. The sort of thing that someone who would fall for the Y2K thing would have fallen for.
Keep the grains and legumes dry, put them in airtight glass jars, lock down barrels, or sealable (even ZipLoc type) plastic bags. Then if there is a possibility that they contain insect eggs, especially weavils, freeze the jars or bags for two days, let them thaw for a week, then freeze them for two more days. This kills any adult insects, allows the eggs to germinate after the cold layering, and then kills any eggs that hatch. Now your staples are good for decades.
You can't do this with four or meal. The grain's longevity depends on its ingenious seedcoat. Once that seedcoat is broken by grinding, the oils begin to rancify. That is why the germ, the most nutrive part, of all grains is removed before they are ground into flour or meal, otherwise the flour would rancify, sour, on the store shelf. Commercial meals and flours, already devoid of nutrients, have a short shelf life and lose what nutrition they have rather quickly.
Whole grain wheat and corn are just as they came from the plant. Rice, barley, oats, and buckwheat have a husk over the groat that is mechanically removed before they are consumed. Those grains are bought as hulled and are still whole grain. You do not want the 'pearled' or 'polished' variety of them because both the protection of the groat and its nutrients have been compromised. In the case of rice, a very little of the oil is disturbed in the hulling process and this oil will give whole brown rice a sort of rancid smell when you first open a closed container of it. It's harmless and in no wise indicates compromised rice.
Keep the grains whole until just before you use them. The only exception to this I'd recommend considering is the case of 'steel cut oats.' The hulled groats have been run through steel knife edges and cut into three or four pieces. This is the so called 'pinhead oats' what is sold for a fortune as genuine Irish oatmeal. Quaker oats and such have been steamed and then flatteded and dehydrated. Not a bad food all in all but far inferior to real oatmeal.
Whole beans, peas, and lentils don't store anywhere as long as wheat or corn, but they probably outlive us anyway. Treat them and store them exactly like the grains.
It is not necessary to freeze whole grains or beans to extend their shelf life.
posted by Eleutheros at 1:28 PM
3 Comments:
came by way of the Madcapmum - and really really enjoyed reading your site. Look forward to stopping by again!
That's very interesting about the wheat.
i was telling my mother what you said about the cucumber experiment. She has made the same observation.
Madcapmum also directed me to this site. I've been working toward streamlining for purposes of storage and cooking a number of basic items. This information goes way beyond anything I knew and it changes some of the strategies I was working with. Thanks for that.
On the matter of the Egyptian wheat seeds germinating: I don't know the denoument of the original observations, but I find them tantalizing, as a botanist.
There's one thing that I can point to that might be the reason behind skepticism. Dead or near-dead seeds will often germinate (i.e., swell up, throw out cotyledons and radical) but will then die. In a sense they really weren't alive but appear to undergo the stages of germination just because they've soaked up water. I'd be fascinated to know what happened next: did the germinated seedlings then put out true leaves and continue to grow?
And I appreciate your pointing out that it could have been contaminating seeds from a more recent era. It would be heady to think that an ancient line of wheat had been resurrected.
BTW - I didn't realize until I got through the writing that I couldn't put in my name and URL - fortunately I do have an unrelated blogger site that I can add that info from.
My personal site is http://sparkleberrysprings.com/v-web/b2 and my non-anonymous name :-) is Wayne.
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