How interesting.....!

This chap's diabetes was cured by eating Long Wheat (ancient Emmer or Kamut) mash every morning and eating low carb generally.

http://www.appropedia.org/Diabetes_mellitus_cured_-_George%27s_experience

The ancient wheat strains (14 chromosome as opposed to the 42 chromosome modern highly-hybridised dwarf 'wheat' strains) is a far healthier option. He obviously recognises there are many phytoelements within the grain that are very beneficial (B vitamins???), that are not found in the modern strains or in corrupted flour.

Many decry grains in general, but the simple proteins found in ancient strains do not contain the complex 'foreign' proteins that disrupt and damage the body. The 'bread of life' back then was far lower in gluten too.

Food in its natural form is always going to be superior to anything man meddles with. You cannot improve on perfection.....

Yes, cultivated food might be sweeter, juicier, hardier, etc., but what has it lost in the process? There are unknown factors at stake that may well end up doing (or have been doing) far more harm than good.....

AliB wrote:This chap's diabetes was cured by eating Long Wheat (ancient Emmer or Kamut) mash every morning and eating low carb generally.

http://www.appropedia.org/Diabetes_mellitus_cured_-_George%27s_experience

The ancient wheat strains (14 chromosome as opposed to the 42 chromosome modern highly-hybridised dwarf 'wheat' strains) is a far healthier option.  He obviously recognises there are many phytoelements within the grain that are very beneficial (B vitamins???), that are not found in the modern strains or in corrupted flour.

Many decry grains in general, but the simple proteins found in ancient strains do not contain the complex 'foreign' proteins that disrupt and damage the body.  The 'bread of life' back then was far lower in gluten too.

Food in its natural form is always going to be superior to anything man meddles with. You cannot improve on perfection.....

Yes, cultivated food might be sweeter, juicier, hardier, etc., but what has it lost in the process?  There are unknown factors at stake that may well end up doing (or have been doing) far more harm than good.....

Interesting to read this Ali ....thanks.

Food in it's natural form, whole fresh food, is always going to be superior to anything man meddles with, processes etc.

Foods we eat today are so far apart from the ancients. Feeding the many on five loaves and two fish. Those loaves and fish would not have been tainted with today's pollutants.

Having said that surely no matter what time you lived there would always have been pollutants? Waste was thrown in the water or put back on the land ....but of course not in the same huge amounts that we have today.

All things considered I think I will stick with my LCHF lifestyle, and do my best to stay away from eating too much processed foods.

All the best Jan
         

Has anyone on here ever used Emmer or Long wheat?

sanguine wrote:Has anyone on here ever used Emmer or Long wheat?

I haven't myself Rod,hadn't even heard of it until Ali posted about it today.

A source of Emmer is:
http://www.shipton-mill.com/flour-direct/organic-emmer-wholemeal-414.htm

I haven't, but would like to get some.  I bought some (probably dwarf) wheat from Winchester mill and an electric 'whisper' mill (that sounds like Concorde taking off!), as grain is far more nutritious when freshly ground.  

I learned about slow-rise bread by accident when I was researching gluten a few years back.  The writer was saying that he had found that those with gluten issues could eat his bread without any problems, so I made the Hub some and amazingly it worked.

I would use half freshly ground wholemeal, half strong white flour and make the dough in the evening, making sure ALL the flour is incorporated thoroughly.  Some make no-knead bread, but I would knead mine in my trusty old Chef.  I would clean the bowl around so there is no loose flour, or put the dough in a clean bowl, cover it and pop it in the fridge overnight.

It would come out of the fridge about 9 or 10am, be knocked back (I use olive oil to knead and mould it rather than loose flour) and put in the tin (I prefer a silicone mould as it's much easier to get the bread out), switch the oven on to 40 degrees, turn it off and pop the dough in to rise for a couple of hours, then bake it.

It would be very interesting to know whether bread made with Emmer wheat would affect the blood sugar like the American Dwarf hard wheat.  I also wonder if using sourdough would make any more of a difference.  Baker's yeast Saccharomyces Cerevisiae, is just one strain, whilst sourdough has many kinds of beneficial microbes that all do different things within the dough.  That suggests to me that sourdough would very likely be more nutritious in some way.

Actually, that triggered me to go and have a look online, and the consensus is that sourdough IS more nutritious and better for you overall.

Poor old grains get blamed for a lot of ills, and People out there like Dr. Davis and the Paleo Crowd are constantly spouting how evil it is, and as far as the modern wheat strains go, they may well be right, but they are far removed from the ancient simple protein wheat strains.

Isn't it amazing how reading one article can lead you onto reading another ....and another. You end up learning about something you'd not previously heard of.

According to Wiki "Emmer's main use is as a human food, though it is also used for animal feed. Ethnographic evidence from Turkey and other emmer-growing areas suggests that emmer makes good bread (judged by the taste and texture standards of traditional bread), and this is supported by evidence of its widespread consumption as bread in ancient Egypt. Emmer bread is available in Switzerland. In Italy, whole emmer grains can be easily found in most supermarkets and groceries, emmer bread (pane di farro) can be found in bakeries in some areas, and emmer has traditionally been consumed in Tuscany as whole grain in soup. Higher in fiber than common wheat, emmer's use for making pasta is a recent response to the health food market; some consumers[who?], however, judge that emmer pasta has an unattractive texture. Emmer has also been used in beer production. As with most varieties of wheat, however, emmer is probably unsuitable for sufferers from wheat allergies or coeliac disease."

I believe it can be obtained from here http://www.dovesfarm.co.uk/

You also mentioned sourdough being more nutritious and better for you overall.....you may well be right. Out at a recent family gathering sourdough was available, I didn't try it, perhaps I should have done. But I'm reliably informed that it does taste delicious far better then 'normal bread'

Having read and said all this ......as I've said previously - all things considered I think I will stick with my LCHF lifestyle, and do my best to stay away from eating too much processed foods.

But it does get the old grey cells thinking ............

All the best Jan