Wednesday, July 25, 2012

It's Pronounced "Keen-wah."

42.  "The whiter the bread, the sooner you’ll be dead." 
43.  Avoid sugary and starchy food if you're concerned about your weight. 
44.  Favor the kinds of oils and grains that have traditionally been stone-ground.


In case you've been wondering to yourself, WTF does a millet casserole look like?  It looks like this:



And this:

And since there seemed a lot of speculation in general about what on earth a millet casserole is, and why in God's name I would be inspired to make one, I thought the topic of millet and other lesser known grains merited a bit more discussion.

Millet is in my opinion, is a highly under-rated grain.  Often dismissed as birdseed, it's actually a nutrient rich whole grain packed with protein.  It's so good for you that I often find myself wondering, "what's the catch?"  It's way too delicious to be as good for you as it is; it's got a mild, bready flavor that I mentioned earlier makes a great base for a casserole.  I got turned on to millet, along with quinoa, buckwheat, kamut, barley, and farro last year, during the week and a half my friend Jenna somehow convinced me that it would be great to go on a macrobiotic diet.  I don't know how she convinced me of this; nothing about macrobiotics is in any way conducive to my lifestyle or tastes.  I mean, don't get me wrong, I think there's definitely something to the idea, but I just love bread and cheese way too much to adopt a largely vegan diet that relies heavily on whole grains.

And by whole grains, I don't mean whole grain like your bread is whole grain or like General Mills claims their cereal is "whole grain."  I mean, like the whole. grain.  The whole thing.  Apparently you don't just have to eat grains after they've been ground up into flour.  And apparently there are other grains besides wheat, rice and corn!  Who knew?  Before I went on my brief but informative macro-spree I was vaguely aware of such grains, but never considered them a viable option.

So the basic idea of macrobiotics (if I remember correctly, which I probably don't) is that you should eat leafy greans ALL THE TIME.  Just, like, all the time.  With every meal.  Tons.  And then you supplement with various vegetables and grains.  But whole grains; refined flour is kind of a no-no.  As are meats and other animal by-products.  But I did learn two important things from the experiment:  1) I really love leafy greens and 2) other grains exist besides wheat and rice.

These revelations proved to be important when starting this project because, as evidenced by the rules above, the Food Rules don't look too kindly on bread.  Definitely not white bread.  Number 42 speaks for itself; as for 43, I can't think of anything that says sugary and starchy better than a big, white baguette.  And what Pollan means when he says stick to grains that were traditionally stone ground is this:  if you had a mano and metate right now, and you ground those grains down yourself, would the flour make the bread you're eating now?  If you've got a piece of Wonderbread sitting in front of you, the answer is no.  You can't stone-grind white flour.  It's a whole process.  

I think if you were to really do the rules right, you might want to cut out bread all together.  I mean, when you think about just turning grain into flour is process, isn't it?  Of course, I can't get that hardcore.  Just sticking to whole wheat flour is a project in and of itself.  Sometimes I want to scream at the top of my lungs in the middle of the grocery store (the co-op, even), OH MY GOD SERIOUSLY PEOPLE HOW HARD IS IT TO GET A LOAF OF BREAD WITHOUT WHITE FLOUR WHAT IS WRONG WITH THE WORLD!?!?  


But I have been playing around with more whole grains under the basic philosophy that the whole-er, the better.  I made that millet bake last week.  I made a buttermilk farro salad this week:

For the recipe, click here.


Though, full disclosure: the faro is pearled, which means that some of the nutrient- and fiber-rich outer bran removed, like in white rice.  I'm not sure where things like that lie on the Food Rules continuum, but someone told me that grains that have had some of their goodness stripped away are still better for you than, say, whole wheat that's been turned into flour.  And at this point I feel so saturated with nutritional philosophies, I have no idea.  It probably depends on your definition of "good for you."  Anyway, pearled farro was what the co-op had, so pearled farro was what Leigh made.  And it was good. 

I'm getting off topic.  Moral of the story: whole grains unexplored healthy fun.  Even before I started this project, I rejoiced when I discovered all these new grains because, as much as love bread and pasta, everything eventually gets old.  So... next time you're feeling bored in the kitchen... try some millet?  And stop making fun of me for eating birdseed.

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