In the last subject we covered Flours & Grains; which ones are best to eat and which ones to avoid. If you haven’t read through that lesson’s content, please go back and read it before continuing on.
Grains Can be Part of a Healthy Diet…IF Treated Properly.
All grains, seeds, and legumes are armed with an internal defense mechanism called ‘anti-nutrients’. But before we explain this further, we must first understand how a seed grows. So let’s take a look.
How a Seed Grows
Inside every seed, grain, or legume is a tiny plant with leaves, stems, and root parts waiting for the right things to happen to make it grow.
If you place a seed on your counter it will not grow. If you put it in the ground, it will not grow……until you water it. Watering the seed allows the seed to sprout and grow, releasing the enzymes and necessary nutrients, giving the tiny plant energy.
So what is it that keeps the seed from growing until it is wet?
Two things called Phytic Acid and Enzyme Inhibitors.
What do they both mean for you?
If you consume a raw seed, the Phytic Acid within the seed will block the absorption of most of the vitamins and minerals.
The Enzyme Inhibitors do just as the name sounds, they inhibit and “hold hostage” the many enzymes within the seed which help to digest it.
So what can we do?
There are a number of things that can be done to help make our grains & seeds more digestible, and make the nutrients more readily available to our bodies. The main thing being “Soaking”. Soaking our grains helps to neutralize the Phytic Acid / Enzyme Inhibitors. This processes is relatively easy and just takes a little of our time and some pre-planning.
Method to Neutralize Phytic Acid / Enzymes Inhibitors
Soaking Grains: The “How To”
Soaking our grains is one of the easiest processes to make them more nutritious and easier to digest. When making just about any recipe (with a few exceptions), you can soak the flour in an acidic medium (such as buttermilk, yogurt, whey, or water with some lemon juice or vinegar added).
Example – if you are making muffins and the recipe called for milk as the liquid, simply replace it with buttermilk or another acidic medium. Mix it with the flour called for in the recipe, cover and let set at room-temperature for 12 to 24 hours. After that time you may proceed with the rest of the recipe. Doing this will neutralize the phytic acid and break down the enzyme inhibitors, allowing your body to assimilate the nutrients and digest the grain much more easily.
Whole Grains, such as brown rice or oatmeal, as well as ground grains (flour) will need to be “soaked” before cooking to get the best nutrition and digestion out of them.
If this whole “soaking” thing has you a little bewildered, no worries. Cooking God’s Way has numerous recipes that include and explain this “soaking” method so that you do not have to figure it out.
A Few Recipes to Get Started with “Soaking”:
– Easy Blender “Overnight” Pancakes or Waffles
– Baked Oatmeal Squares
– Ultimate Whole-Grain Blueberry Muffins
– Easy Maple-Blueberry Steel Cut OatmealMany people who have certain intolerance’s to grains will be able to tolerate them well when they are prepared according to these procedures – soaking, sprouting, and/or sourdough. (NOTE: If you have sensitivities, intolerance’s, and/or allergies to grains – please seek the advice of your Physician/Naturopath, etc. before attempting to consume grains using these methods.)
If you want to study Phytic Acid and its role in grains further, I highly recommend Buying the “Phytic Acid Paper” at Rebuild Market.
Other Tips for Preparing Grains:
Raw Nuts should also be soaked to remove Phytic Acid – for more info please see this article on “Raw Nuts: How to Soak & Why?”
Another fun way to reduce ‘anti-nutrients’ is “Sprouting”. For more information on this process and how to do it, see this article – “Sprouts: Super Nutritious & Easy to Make at Home”
There are other ways to reduce Phytic Acid as well. Such as “Sourdough”, which is in fact one of the best ways, but is definitely a more involved and advanced subject than this course can cover.
Lesson Assignment: Try one of the many recipes on Cooking God’s Way that incorporates “soaking”, such as some Easy Blender “Overnight” Pancakes or Waffles, or one of the many other recipes available on this site.
Share some of your changes with the group in a comment below. We, or others, could have suggestions.