Diastic malt

Diastatic malt has long been a secret of professional bread makers in Europe. It is made from sprouted grains that have been dried and ground. In bread recipes, it replaces the sugar or honey needed to feed the yeast and brown the crust. Because diastatic malt is full of enzymes and vitamins, it increases the nutritional value of the bread. In addition, the action of the enzymes on the yeast and flour improves both the flavor and appearance of the bread; it creates a finer texture and helps the bread stay fresh.

Diastatic malt can be made at home using wheat berries, purchased from a health food store, and your food dehydrator. When using it in bread recipes, remember that it is very potent and only a small amount is needed.

Don't forget that your dehydrator makes a wonderful place to raise your bread.

The method: Place one cup of wheat berries in a wide-mouth glass jar and add 4 cups tepid water. Cover with a piece of nylon net; secure with a rubber band. Let soak about 12 hours. Drain off water (save for soup stock or use to water your plants - it’s full of minerals). Rinse well with tepid water, and drain completely. Repeat rinsing process 3 times a day for 2 days or until the little shoots are about the same length as the grains.

Rinse and drain once again. Place on teflon sheets and allow to dry at medium heat in your dryer. Grind dried sprouts to a fine flour in an electric grinder or blender. This will yield about 1 cup of diastatic malt. Store in a tightly closed glass jar in the refrigerator or freezer. It will keep indefinitely.

http://www.dryit.com/diastaticmalt.html

Cream of wheat cereal complete

New recipe for almost instant (except it has to be cooked about 5 minutes) cream of wheat cereal (and a bit of added protein).

My cream of wheat cereal mix - kept in freezer and is just add water and cook.

CREAM OF WHEAT CEREAL MIX – complete with salt, sugar and milk
Mix
1/4 c ground cereal wheat
2 t powdered milk
2 t sugar or your choice of sweetener
1/2 T white bean flour
1/8 t salt

1 cup water
¼ c cereal mix

Bring water to boil. Wisk cereal mix into water. Turn down heat and cook about 5 minutes, until cereal has thickened to consistency you desire. If it is too thick, just add a little water.

Guess it wouldn't be considered "whole" now but it surely is good and fills the body and warms the soul and is just add water, which is a big factor in ease for me.

I can't believe I really did this.

I knew I needed to make bread today. Last night I had some sauerkraut and as I was putting the left-overs away, I wondered what I would do with them. I had the thought to put them in the bread. Now I know I would not think such a thought. It had to come from somewhere else.

I remembered this morning, and that's unusual, so I did it!!! And as long as I was doing "it", I also blended some wheat sprouts with it that needed to be used - probably about 1/3 cup. I added 1 cup water with it so it would blend and then added the remaining amount when it was called for. Amazing that when the dough got all mixed, there was only a very slight hint of the smell of sauerkraut. When it was baked, there was no smell of it and the bread turned out great!

What does all this mean? I have no idea! But I guess this is one way to get those fermented enzymes in there.

Here's the original bread recipe - no sauerkraut (tee hee)

Whole Wheat Bread (takes about an hour and makes 2 - 8x4 loaves)
3 c whole wheat flour
1/3 c gluten flour, sifted
1 1/4 T. instant yeast
2 1/2 c very warm tap water
1 T salt
1/3 c oil
1/3 c honey or 1/2 c sugar
1 1/4 T bottled lemon juice
2 cups whole wheat flour

Mix together first three ingredients in mixer with a dough hook. Add water all at once and mix for 1 minute. Cover and let rest for 10 minutes. Add salt, oil, honey or sugar and lemon juice and beat for 1 minute. Add last flour 1 cup at a time, beating between each cup. Beat for about 6-10 minutes until dough pulls away from sides of the bowl. This makes a very soft dough.
Preheat oven for 1 minute to lukewarm and turn off. Turn dough onto oiled counter top; divide, shape into loaves, place in oiled bread pans. Let rise in warm oven for 10-15 minutes until dough reaches top of pan. Do not remove bread from oven, turn oven to 350 degrees F and bake for 30 minutes. Remove from pans and cook on racks.

Basak

Snack time

Two little boys - 4 and 5 1/2 -- were buggin' me for snack. I was quite busy and they were supposed to be playing -- ya all know how that goes. So to the kitchen I go to try and find something for snack. I had wheat sprouts in a bowl on the cupboard - trying to decide what I wanted to do with them, leftovers from breakfast and they were a little past the sweetest part of eating them but still very good. I'd just made a green smoothie which also had ground sprouts in it. Well, I saw a no-work for me snack and just did it, wondering how it would go over. Their cups were over half full of the smoothie and I just put some sprouts in a little bowl and got them two grain crackers. Of course the sprouts have roots coming out pretty good now and kind of cling to each other. The youngest took some and made the "mmmmm" sound. The older one took some in his fingers and was looking at the conglomeration when I left. When I came back a few minutes later, they were all gone and so was their smoothie! I have to admit, I was quite surprised and I did learn that the spider-like look of the sprouts intrigued them and made them more fun to eat. Oh what we learn when we experiment! LOL

Basak

PS on popped wheat and "finished" recipe

Got the soft wheat and it was successful, too.

Would I buy soft wheat just for this?

Nope!

Amazingly we have found we do prefer the red wheat --- but we think ALL of it is just YUMMY!!!!





After making many, many batches, I've pretty well got this refined!!! I'm sure you're thinkin' I'm obsessed but if I can save anyone some of the time and testing to get to the wonderful finished product, so be it! LOL

RECIPE
1 cup rinsed wheat and at least 4 cups water --- boil 1 hr 30 min, adding water if needed. Drain well. One cup of wheat before cooked will equal about six batches to be fried.

Put a couple inches of oil in a pot for deep fat frying. Heat to 360 degrees. Put 1/2 cup of the cooked wheat in a frying basket when oil reaches 360 degrees. Cook for 2 min. 45 sec. to 3 minutes or until it turns a good (deep) golden brown. The small bubbling will come to an almost complete stop and the oil temperature will again be very close to 360 degrees. Drain on a paper towel and salt or season as you desire. Cool completely and store in a glass jar. (see March 30 post for seasoning suggestions)

Notes: The above reached our desire of crunchy and puffiness. We found undercooked was about as bad as overdone. Did you know some of the wheat, if boiled long enough, will turn inside out? I cooked it trying to get it all to do it (for hours) and found not all turned. When the wheat is cooked for the hour and thirty minutes, it has opened sufficiently. I tried many variables to process more in the frying process but none turned out as good as just 1/2 cup.)

Basak

Popped wheat experimenting and SUCCESS

Our Bishop's very favorite treat is popped wheat. Now I've tried it with the frying pan method and haven't been too impressed so I was quite intrigued. Things weren't working too well with him remembering how -- so search and experiment we've gone. I just knew if it was his favorite treat, it must be good!!

My husband learned what I was trying to do and waa laa -- he did some searching and came up with a couple recipes. He takes very good care of me!

I'm just a little twisted when it comes to more than one recipe and have to find out which one is the best. Causes LOTS of work but I surely learn a lot. And I always remember that practice makes perfect. LOL We finally had it tasting like corn nuts -- except it was wheat. We were pleased. We had the Bishop sample and we were very close. He then gave us a bag of what he buys -- so now we could really compare and back to experimenting we went.

Ya know -- sometimes it just takes many to succeed. We decided to use some white wheat and we considered it even more successful. My son made a suggestion or two and after another batch .......WE ARE SO THERE ....... but still want to do just a little tweaking.

To be quite frankly honest, I think we've succeeded pretty well with all of them because we've eaten about 10 batches and loved every one of them. LOL One recipe said to use soft wheat berries. I've changed my philosophy - which was that if it couldn't be made with hard red wheat, then I wasn't going to make it - and ordered some. I will make a batch or two just to see if they make it even more like the professionally made.

My husband is now eating LOTS of wheat. So typical -- we zap all the life out of it when we do things like this and then love it! WARNING -- this has zero - that's a big 0 - nutritional value.


Notice - there is still a little difference in the puffiness but I think that can be obtained by cooking it just a little longer. You want it to split and it will be kind of sticky.

And now -- the RECIPE!!!

1 cup wheat --- the above was cooked for 1 hr 15 min. If it were cooked longer, I believe it would be the puffiness I desire. Drain and put on a towel and let dry a bit (10-15 minutes). One cup of wheat before cooked will equal about six batches to be fried.

Put a couple inches of oil in a pot large enough for deep fat frying. Heat to 360 degrees.

Put 1/2 cup of the cooked wheat in a wire basket or strainer and put in the oil. Cook for 2 min 20 seconds or until it turns a good (deep) golden brown. (When you use less wheat at a time, the oil temp does not fall and that was a factor in the experimenting.) Drain on a paper towel and salt or season as you desire. Cool completely and store in a glass jar -- if you have any left. LOL (See recipe added on April 19 for the refined, tried & tested recipe)

I do not have a strainer that has small enough holes so the wheat does not fall through. So to get them out, I put a strainer on another pan and poured the oil and fried wheat into it. I then put the wheat on the paper towel and poured the oil back into the cooking pot. Whatever works!!

Some suggestions for seasonings and uses on the recipes we found were: salt; onion salt; garlic salt; barbecue salt; dust with powdered ranch dressing; sprinkle with Kraft Grated American Cheese Food (sharp cheddar flavor); use it as a cereal served with honey, butter and milk; add to dried fruit and chocolate chips for a great trail mix; wonderful on salads; cinnamon and sugar; mixed with granola or any trail mix; as a topping for ice cream and desserts; or just by the handful.

Basak

A sprou-ting we will go, a sprou-ting we will go, heigh ho, the diary-o....

Gwenith,
I finally got the picture taking done. Did I forget anything?






Day 1 - 8am

This is 1/4 cup rinsed wheat covered in water (rinsing is just to clean it). You can use any quantity you desire.









Day 1- 8pm
After 12 hours in water, kernels are plump. They are rinsed, drained well (this is very important), put back in the jar (also drained of any sitting water) and will sit overnight.







Day 2 - 7am

Some are beginning to show a little white root coming out on one end. Again, the seeds are rinsed, drained well and put back in the jar for the day.








Day 2 - 6 pm


You can now see a hair-like root coming out of the white root. And once again, rinse, drain well and leave in jar overnight.









Day 3 - 7am We have more than one hair-like root coming out but notice the sprout that is now just beginning. Eating sometimes begins now. Rinse, drain well and let sit in jar.



Day 3 - 6pm

The sprout is almost the length of the kernel of wheat and that's when it's the best. Notice the jar and how the seeds have expanded in the room they take in the jar. You can rinse, drain well, cover and put in the refrigerator. They continue to grow and will keep for several days, rinsing every 2-3 days. Rinse before using.



























Day 4 - 6am

READY TO EAT!!












Some notes:
There are many instructions out there but if you think about the natural growing process, it really doesn't matter if the water is cold or warm. What if you forget to rinse? Just do the next step when you remember (just like waiting for rain). It'll just be a little slower accomplishing what you're doing. What if you forget and the soak process was 24 hours? Just drain, rinse and continue the process. Tap water works just fine. Some say to put the container in the dark - on the counter is fine. The only thing you do NOT want to do is let the container come into direct sunlight and this applies throughout the whole process. Most instructions tell you to rinse and drain three times a day - simplify and twice is nice! There are always the faster ones and the slower ones - it all works out. If you are using a sprout bag or a container that the hair-like roots start entwining, just massage them a little to separate them when rinsing. The wheat sprouts are sweetest at the beginning stage. The longer the sprout, the less sweet they become. Some say even sprouting to the length of the kernel is too long.

Basak

Eating more wheat

In the "Search for Word Meanings" post on Feb. 10, 2009, I said: "Could the "demand" and "falling short" pertain to the body? Will we yet find our bodies, indeed, do not get enough?"

I've not been able to get this thought out of my mind and so for over two weeks, I have been trying to incorporate more wheat into my daily eating. I'm not organized enough yet to plan dinners - although I throw in cooked wheat berries (just cooked whole wheat) into soups and spaghetti sauce, etc., but we have not eaten those during this time. I do have a desire to be able to cook dinners and this morning could feel that is coming soon (the line upon line thing). But for these two weeks, it has been a matter of getting it into my body. So, what I've been eating is mainly cream of wheat cereal, wheat sprouts and whole wheat bread. I've eaten these things with a little milk, 1/4 t of sugar, Raisin Bran, blueberries, apples, cinnamon, butter, sometimes a little jam or honey, and green smoothies (with greens, fruit - bananas, strawberries or blueberries, flax or chia seeds and maybe some sprouts) and one time some pinto beans. I have eaten dinner with the family and that meal usually has not include wheat and hate to admit it, but they have not been the "healthy, healthy". You can see that this has not been a not eat anything but wheat venture but just eat more of it.

When I began, I tested to see where the level of wheat was in my body. I was about 1/3 of 100% which is where it should be. This really surprised me. I had no idea it would be so low. So as I've been eating more and more wheat, I continued to test. It has slowly and gradually climbed but it always would quickly fall. It didn't take much eating to get it back to where the maximum reached was but I was beginning to wonder if I could ever reach 100%. Remember, this has been going on for over two weeks. And I had never thought about maintaining that 100% consistently -- which it really should.

Yesterday, I reached 100%. When I woke up this morning, I was about 85%. I ate breakfast and was again at 100%. At this time (about noon and before lunch), I am still at 100%. I sometimes test vitamins and minerals and decided I would see where they were --- and, they are also up.

And what differences have I noticed? I am rarely hungry between meals and I have absolutely no cravings and I feel good!!!! Yesterday while wondering what the body would do when wheat was at 100%, I had the thought that weight would not be as problematic. I liked that thought!!!! Don't know if it was power of suggestion, but this morning, my jeans were looser and my weight loss always shows on the body before the scales. Further observations in this area will be occurring!! LOL

This is SOOOOOOO exciting to me. Could it really be this simple that we just need to eat more of it and as Gwenith said in her post on "Enzymes" (Feb. 20), "...sometimes in raw form, sometimes cooked, sometimes soaked or fermented, then we are being ‘moderate in all things’ and getting the benefits of all forms..."

I LOVE this quest!!!!!
Basak

(Word meanings have been added for quicker reference.)

staff of life: a staple of diet
staple: the sustaining or principal element; a commodity for which the demand is constant
principal: most important

nevertheless: but rather;
scarce: deficient in quantity or number compared with the demand and
implies falling short of a standard or required abundance

Cracked Wheat Patties - tasty!

Basak,
Onward and upward (an inside joke between us!)

I really like this recipe given to me by my friend Gwyn.

CRACKED WHEAT PATTIES

2 cups cooked cracked wheat
2 Tbsp dry milk powder
1 egg (or 2-3 egg whites)
½ cup chopped onion**
1 Tbsp dried parsley
2 ½ tsp. chicken bouillon

This recipe works well with the wheat cracked into fairly small pieces (3-4 cracks per kernel as opposed to 2). Mix all ingredients. If mixture is too moist, add ¼- ½ cups whole wheat flour. Roll into ball (about 2-3 inches in diameter). What really makes this recipe good is if you 'bread' or roll the ball in a mixture of some whole wheat flour, lemon pepper, and season salt (I might try about 1 C. of flour to 1/4 to 1/2 t. each of the lemon pepper and season salt). Drop by tablespoon or ice cream scoop into pan heated with small amount of hot oil. Flatten ball to a patty shape. Brown patties on both sides in oil. Serve hot or cold. I like to serve just like a hamburger - on hamburger buns with mayo, ketchup, and other favorite condiments.

**To substitute dried onion with fresh onion, 1/2 C. fresh onion equals 1 1/2 T. dried onion flakes. Cook the onion flakes with the cracked wheat so they are softened. Or you can use 1 1/2 t. onion powder.

To make a ground meat consistency, mix as above, pour into pan, stir and cook until looks like ground meat cooked. Use 2 cups for 1 lb. of cooked ground meat.

The only difficult thing about this recipe for me is that bouillon contains so much MSG. I'm trying to stay away from that (for reasons why, go to www.msgmyth.com). An option I thought of was to cook the cracked wheat in homemade chicken broth/stock and then eliminate bouillon from the recipe.

Gwenith

Peter Reinhart's Whole Grain Breads

I wanted to let you know about a book -- a good book about bread. Peter Reinhart's Whole Grain Breads: New Techniques, Extraordinary Flavor (2007) is a book with very advanced techniques on making breads. It is for people who are serious about learning how to make good whole grain bread. This is an advanced breadmaking course - the graduate level! There is history and science here. There is technical detail and scientific precision. There is laying things out step-by-step and explaining them in detail. His delayed fermentation process not only makes the bread taste better but it makes the bread more nutritious. There are also many recipes for all types of bread: sandwich breads, buns, artisan breads, crackers, etc. This guy knows his bread and I recommend his book to any of you who really want to get deep into breadmaking!

(Disclaimer: I (Gwenith) am not a master or an expert on this subject by any means! I was therefore interested in learning more and I have read the book and have tried a couple of recipes so far. I have learned much from this book and still have much to learn and I am grateful to have it!)

Gwenith

The basic of the basics - cream of wheat cereal

It was amazing to me when I fed this to my grandchildren. We add a little milk. stir and then drizzle a little honey on it. They LOVE it!! I've personally always found this warming, comforting and good and it's soooo basic and simple. I've given the raw ground wheat to others and ground some for many more and most have reported that they love it.

1 cup boiling water
1/4 cup cereal
salt to taste (1/8-1/4 tsp)

Add cereal to boiling water while wisking. Cook 5-7 minutes.

Left: raw cereal Right: cream of wheat cereal

A blender can be used to grind wheat to make the cereal. Cereal can also be made from flour.

Turn your blender into a grain mill VIDEO

Basak

Oh -- so we're talking about our FAVORITE!

This no-knead bread was the BEST find!!! I'm beginning to wonder if you can mess it up. I've tried several times. LOL Our favorite is 1 1/2 cups white flour and 1 1/2 cups of a 7-grain flour mix which includes about half wheat flour. The only thing bad about it is -- we eat the whole thing in one sitting! We also really enjoy the whole wheat -- and add some vital gluten. It is sooooo easy and sooooo fun to make and sooooo good to eat!!!!!

Because of the fermentation that occurs, it's doing neat things with enzymes. I will continue to work on perfecting the whole wheat but will probably often add some of the 7-grain flour just because it's wonderful. It definitely helps get more wheat into our bodies!

Basak

No-Knead Bread

If you're like me, you want that breadmaking to be easy and simple. If this is you, then you must watch this video clip! Mark Bittman is the chef who writes for the New York Times. He visited a NY bakery to learn an incredibly simple, quick way to make bread (quick meaning takes little of your time - you actually do let the dough sit for a day). In the column for the NY Times he writes that this works for whole grains even though the video shows white flour. Now I have to say that I have only made this once and I totally messed up (I used the speedy recipe ingredients for the regular recipe instructions) and it was still really good bread. I also used the white flour recipe for my first time but I did 2 parts white flour to 1 part whole wheat flour -- still very good bread despite all of these changes! I used a cast iron dutch oven that I have for camping to cook the bread in.

Video - from You Tube and the link to the NY Times story from 2006. (Recipe)

Happy bread making!
Gwenith

Green wheat sprout smoothie surprise

I made our green smoothie this morning and used 6 leaves of green leaf lettuce, 2 cups water, 2 1/2 smaller bananas, 2 T chia seeds and 1 cup of wheat sprouts (made one quart of smoothie). I've put sprouts in them before but it's probably only been about 1/3 cup. I just had this thought to taste it and I was pleasantly surprised - it was quite good. I then decided to make it even more desirable and put some frozen mixed berries in (was probably 1 1/2 cups because it fell in in a clump) and it didn't taste nearly as good.

I do know wheat sprouts are extremely sweet and you can make diastatic malt with them; but I have to admit, I was quite surprised because it didn't taste "wheaty" to me at all. This just expanded my thinking and onward and upward with experimenting I'll go!!!

Basak

Green smoothies we did and do

We both did the green smoothie learning and love them!! It is important in healthy eating but other than adding wheat sprouts and rejuvelac from time to time, it seems to be only a small part, if any, to the answers we are seeking. However, as progress goes, this may be more than we now think it is if we were to use wheat in them more often.

Basak

Husband sick blues

Ah -- glad wheat grass has been introduced. After reading Ann Wigmore's books, I knew there's something to this -- and the rejuvelac (but we'll talk about that later).

My husband had his first angioplasty when he was 48. Scared me!!! They said after he got finished he'd feel like dancing. I went into the room as he was telling the nurse his chest really hurt. She called others. I stepped into the corner and watched as many others came into the room and put all the monitors on him and the meds under his tongue. I thought to myself, "This surely doesn't look like dancing to me!" The doctor came in and said it must have closed again and they'd do it again the next morning.

At 55 he had complete kidney failure because of kidney stones. At 58 he had a stint put in his heart. Of course, all of that requires many medications.

Stress is also a big factor in all of this and he has always had BIG stress in his work - some self inflicted (but don't we all). Family heredity is the usual for all he has goin' on.

Of course, my desire was to help with his health and I began growing wheat grass. He had to go have some blood work done and he'd been drinking the 2 oz a day for a few days. He had the best lipid profile he'd had in years. Of course, he thought it was the oatmeal he'd eaten the previous morning. lol

We made the decision that he should quit that stress. The most wonderful thing for me is I have my "real" husband back ---- but we have no insurance. Prescriptions eventually ran out. There had to be a better way. We now faithfully use wheat grass juice. We do take a break for a day every 7-10 days (depending on where the growing is).



I use a little hand juicer that I absolutely love! I'm sure it can be found in other places, too.

Everyone has a story. The good thing about a blog is one can check to see if it's been posted before. Teehee

Basak