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In with the Good

Most cereals and legumes (grains and beans) have something called phytic acid in them. It can be up to five percent. 

Not good. 

Phytic acid is an anti-nutrient. Plants always have several different kinds of anti-nutrients that should be removed. 

Why? It’s in the name itself. An anti-nutrient like phytic acid prevents animals, including humans, from getting nutrition from food. 

Very bad. 

So, how are anti-nutrients removed? First off, there are quite a few things in raw or unprocessed foods that act as anti-nutrients. Mostly, because they serve as protection. 

Seeds or grains like millet or wheat or rice don’t want to be eaten. There’s just nothing in it for them. 

Sure, fruits like tomatoes like it when you eat their seeds – although you might not mean to – because animals typically run them through their systems intact. 

So, a hundred miles down the road when a well fed raccoon gets rid of the undigested seeds of an apple tree from which it ate only the tastiest and perfectly ripened fruits, that apple tree did it’s part to make apples a forever thing. 

Humans sometimes eat whole grains and seeds, but they mostly can’t digest them. Or at least not the nutrients that are crucial to survival. Plus, a lot of plants have substances that are actually toxic.

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You might get away with eating them in small amounts a few times, but some things build up in your system. And mess you up. Badly.

I‘m going to save dried corn for November, but even if you grind it up finely you must cook it or otherwise remove the anti-nutritional elements and get at the nutrients to not suffer from a nasty nutritional deficiency. Especially if that’s all you eat. 

Take cassava, for example. Eating raw cassava with its anti-nutritional cyanides will eventually hurt you. Or maybe sooner than eventually. You know you should not eat cyanide, right? 

The same goes for any beans or grains that you intend to eat. Soaking them before cooking them will remove a lot of anti-nutritional elements. Sorry if that’s an inconvenient truth. But it is. 

The good part is that soaking foods with skins and hulls can increase their nutritional value. But that’s just one small part of it. 

Germinating food, cooking it, malting it, or fermenting all do that as well. While removing lots of different types of anti-nutrients. 

Using yogurt and all it’s helpful microbes to do so as Priya Mani does in her video on Vethal, or as is done by Dr. Deepa Reddy in her fermented millet dish called Kambu Koozh video are great demonstartions of how fermentation can not just preserve food, but make it more nutritious and tastier. 

The video (subscribe to watch this post’s video) in this post is free to view by anyone. Please make comments or ask questions if you want. If you have subscribed to our Substack – paid or not – you got links to other videos as well. Please consider subscribing, and helping us out if you can. 

Our videos are viewable whenever, and from anywhere you have internet access. Most are closed captioned making them easy to understand or to translate into another language. Here’s a short video on the history and role of fermentation. 

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There are also 200+ videos in our other showcases. New passcodes are available, so contact us if you are a Paying Subscriber or Annual Member. Videos are streaming now. There are 3 months left in 2023. At this point, you get a full membership until the end of 2023.

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The earliest evidence that exists of noodles in China indicates that they were most likely made from millet. Many thousands of years ago. A beverage called Raksi, a made at home alcoholic drink in Tibet, India, and Nepal, is typically made from millet. (Video available to paying and free subscribers at Substack)

Millet porridges, both sweet and savory, are typical items in Chinese, Russian, and German home cooking. They are common around the world, especially among those that can’t affords higher priced, sometimes unavailable grains like wheat.

2023 has been declared the International Year of The Millets. The reason why the word millets as opposed to millet is used is because there are just so many different kinds. With different names depending on where they are being used.

Millets are enormously important crops in tropical and subtropical climates, especially throughout Africa and India, but also in the Southwest and other areas in the US and Mexico.

Low moisture environments, highly acidic soils, hot climates, high salt content soils, and generally infertile soil don’t prevent millets from growing, providing a significant source of protein and calories in areas where wheat and corn just don’t survive.

Millets also make great rotation crops, and some types can grow very quickly.

Some people think millet tastes a little like a slightly nutty, less sweet version of corn, but. it depends entirely on the type of millet and how it is prepared.

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Master Class in Home Made Indian Breads: Bajra Roti

The millet used is this bread or roti is most likely pearl millet (Cenchrus americanus). Known as Bajra in the Hindi language, millets of all kinds are widely cultivated in India for the same reason millets are grown throughout the world. They grow well under severe conditions.

Anshie Renu Dhar is a brilliant baker. And teacher. There are several classic India breads she demonstrates in this year’s showcases. Dosas, idly, flatbreads known as Roti made traditionally and in unique new ways are now streaming, closed captioned.

This is a gluten free, unleavened flatbread made from only pearl millet. Anshie shows both the traditional ways to make this roti, including using a clay skillet more common in rural India.

She also quite brilliantly uses a tortilla press as a hack for those who can’t afford $1200 for a machine called a Rotimatic. (Rotimatic.com, of course). Anshie shows you how it’s been made in India for thousands of years. It’s flour, water and salt.

With ghee when eating for the win, of course.

Bread is an amazing thing. The staff of life can be made from many things. Our goal is to show yo as many of them as we can. Join us? Annual Membership and Annual Subscriptions for $30. You can do that here or at our PayPal site.

The new October showcase of videos for monthly and annual subscribers is now available, with 10 new videos currently streaming. There are 200+ videos in our other showcases. New passcodes are available, so contact us if you are a paying subscriber. All these videos are streaming now.

Our videos are viewable whenever, and from anywhere you have internet access. Most are closed captioned – all the new ones are, thanks to Lia, Stewart, and Ken –  making them easy to understand or to translate into another language.

There are 3 months left in 2023. At this point, you get a full membership until the end of 2023.

Vimeo is where Annual Members, and Substack subscribers, access all our videos. Thanks to the incredible volunteer work or Stewart Kerrigan, Lia Somebody and Ken Fornataro these videos are closed captioned after being extensively edited.

There are many showcases that are frequently updated. Paid Subscribers get the address links and passcodes for the English language closed captioned videos, and access codes for any event we have. You contact us each month for the new addresses and passcodes codes.

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