I am getting all crazy about food again lately. I used to sort of obsess over what we ate, but over the past year or so I have really eased up, and in addition, a lot of my ideas about food have changed. Now I am starting to put more thought into what we eat again and I am starting to make some small changes. I have been grinding my own wheat for many years now, and with the exception of cakes and brownies, which we don’t eat too often (unless Jonny and I are stressed and require nightly batches of brownies), we use freshly ground wheat for all of our breads, muffins, biscuits, etc. Now I am starting to question all the wheat in our diet and I am also re-examining the way we prepare our grains. I have had a copy of Nourishing Traditions for over a year waiting for me to get the nerve to really start digging through it. I was a vegetarian for over ten years (we all started eating some meat again a couple of years ago), so the raw meat thing suggested in the book is probably never going to happen, and I mean never. What I am choosing to focus on right now is the whole grain preparation portion of the book.
Okay if I back up a little bit, what really got me headed down this path was a sourdough bread recipe I read in a copy of Above Rubies magazine. Then I watched the video tutorial here, and decided that I wanted to try this. During the week in which I got my sourdough starter going, I started digging through Nourishing Traditions. The major point that stuck out at me was the suggestion that all grains and legumes should be soaked before being eaten. According to Sally Fallon, the author, all grains contain phytic acid which inhibits the absorption of minerals in the body. Soaking the grains serves to break down the phytic acid and also partially breaks down gluten and difficult to digest proteins. We have tried to eat a gluten free diet before, and Seth was gluten free for quite awhile and I do believe he benifited from the diet. Ultimately though, it was too difficult for our family, not to mention too expensive. I am hoping that we will see benefits by using the methods of grain preparation presented in this cookbook.
I thought that soaking had to occur before grain is ground, which is what has prevented me from going down this route sooner. I didn’t realize you could benefit from soaking flour, or basically mixing your wet ingredients (preferably something cultured) with your grain the night before you want to bake them. So over the next few weeks we are going to experiment with making muffins, biscuits, and breads using flour that has been soaked for 12+ hours with a cultured milk product such as yogurt or buttermilk. The past few days we have eaten our oatmeal this way.
For our family, I soak four cups of rolled oats with a mixture of four cups water and 1/2 cup organic vanilla yogurt. I just mix in a pot, put the lid on, and leave it on the stove overnight. The next morning, I add another four cups of water, bring it to a boil, then cover and lower heat. It cooks in about five minutes. I have been serving it with organic whole milk or half and half. We sweeten with raw honey or sucanat. Today I actually peeled and sliced some apples thickly and cooked them on the stove with some water, sucanat, and cinnamon and topped the oatmeal with that. It was very very good. The oatmeal is very creamy prepared this way. I also like getting started on breakfast the night before, even if it is just the little step of combining some oats and yogurt water.
Back to the bread failure:
On Monday, my starter was ready, very bubbly and sour smelling, so I think I caught my wild yeast. I was soooo excited about making the sourdough bread and forged straight ahead without even thinking of cutting the recipe I was following in half (it makes 4-6 loaves). I poured my rye/spelt dough into bread pans and excitedly watched as it bubbled and rose. However, as I suspected, I added too much water (it needs to be wet, but not too wet-hard to find the right consistency). The bread didn’t cook all the way through and was pretty dang gross. The chickens liked it though, all five loaves of it. I put my starter in the fridge and may revisit this in a few days. I am not sure that I am going to be able to convince my kids to eat the sourdough bread anyway. I may try making the yeasted buttermilk bread in Nourishing Traditions next instead of the sourdough. I am also going to try making it with spelt rather than wheat. We’ll see.
Oh, and the other thing I am excited about is quinoa. We have eaten it for years in one chili recipe, but in nothing else. I am using it now as a rice substitute, and I LOVE it. So for example: instead of beans and rice in a burrito, I make beans and quinoa. It is so good, and so nutritious and my kids eat it. Tonight for dinner we actually had burrito bowls (burrito minus tortilla) and I just ate a bowl full of quinoa, pinto beans that cooked in the crock pot all day, tomatos, shredded lettuce, and a little salt. I haven’t eaten all vegan in ages. I could have never done that with rice; it sort of gags me. I always need a bunch of cheese to force the beans and rice down. No dairy products were necessary for me with this meal.
So anyway, that’s my food excitement (not the excitement I referred to in my last post).
I will be back tomorrow with a Friday Craft post and if I get my act together I am going to host a Friday Craft giveaway as well.
Food Excitement
Sourdough bread failure
Diane says
Did you give up on the sourdough?? I'm in limbo with it right now. I got nourishing traditions awhile ago and made my own starter, too. But, I was also a little less than thrilled with how the bread turned out. So I grew some more starter, gave some to a friend, and now I've got two quarts of it in the fridge waiting for me to try again. In the meantime, though, I'm trying to figure out/research what to do differently to get better results… I'd be really interested to hear the conclusion you came to with it.
Ginny says
Hi BT, we have a Nutrimill grain mill that we use to grind grains and I buy the grains from various sources: health food store that orders it for me in bulk (25-50 pound bags), or from local co-ops. I will try and post about this in more detail soon.
BT says
Wow! I loved this post. It is so motivating. We are big on quinoa at our house too. I love the taste and texture of it. I had not thought to use it in mexican fare but will try that soon. We are a meat-eating household, but we try to do trace amounts, so things like stir fry. And we also comfortably go vegetarian a couple times a week. I hadn't thought of taking us gluten-free. Am very curious how you grind your own grains, what equipment you needed to acquire (and how much space does it take up?), and where you get the whole grains. If you could devote a post to these questions, I would be thrilled! Or just steer me in the right direction.
Gluten Free Sourdoug says
Hi again,I forgot to leave my contact info:glutenfreesourdough.blogspot.comsharon
Gluten Free Sourdoug says
Hi Ginny, I like your blog and love the photos of your beautiful family. I also like the way you are living. My husband and I have a large veg garden, a big composting area and are always trying to reduce our trash by using as much as we can. I upgraded my kitchen last year and even saved the old double sink. It's outside on saw horses and is occasionally used to wash vegetables with water from the hose. Anyway, I read that you're no longer gluten free but I wanted to bring your attention to my gluten free sourdough recipe e-book. Sally Fallon actually published one of my articles including recipes in the summer issue of Wise Traditions. My original title was Gluten Free Sourdough and Weston Price Principles but she changed it to Non Gluten Bread. I successfully combined sourdough bread technique with simple gluten free ingredients, many of which I grind myself, to create excellent breads that little children will eat! Seth may be young enough to have benefitted from gluten free so that he can safely go back to gluten in the ways you are preparing it. (soaking, sourdough, etc). But if you have the need to do some gluten free cooking again for your child my recipes will be in accord with the Weston Price principles. Enjoy your beautiful family. I have taught at alternative school for years, Sudbury Valley School, many of our students were homeschooled before they came to us so I appreciate your homeschool choice. Thanks for your post,sharon
Marj says
Don't you ever wear out, girl??? You are such an inspiration to me to get off my duff and actually do something physical (and healthy). But in my defense, this is the one place I will "play up" my age. It's just so much effort. I had to grind coffee beans tonight before I could make my coffee and I thought I was going to die of exhaustion, ha!!