Jerusalem Artichoke/ Sunchoke

[macmex]

Ceara, that was a great link to Youtube! I just watched it. I'm going to post another link, which was right next to the link you posted (when I watched it). I've never "done" Youtube before. When I'm back in Oklahoma I probably won't be able to either. We have better Internet here in Mexico!

www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7NzOdzP_44&feature=related

George

[stevil]

I thought I remembered reading that lactofermentation can be used to solve the problem. I asked a friend who preserves a lot of veggies this way and he wrote: "One can certainly ferment Jerusalem Artichokes to avoid gas production or alternatively do as the Native Americans and bake them until soft (see www.westonaprice.org/traditional_diets/native_americans.html). Cabbage is also fermented (as Sauerkraut or Surkål) for the same reason."

[utopiate]

I read that link on guts and grease some time ago. Its an interesting and probably pretty accurate portrayal of high animal fat diets of former times in hunting tribes. More emphasis should probably have been put upon the lifestyles of exceedingly vigorous exercise which probably went with the hunter gatherer activaties. I have a lot of game meat in my diet, but the excercise part is not up to snuff.

Slow cooking in underground ovens was the common practice here among native Americans in former times. Usually it was left in the oven for three days (fire being built on top). In the case of camas, another root very high in inulin, this is supposed to turn a lot of the inulin to more digestible sugars, but nonetheless, I found a direct quote from David Douglas's journals from the lower Columbia River in the 1830s when staying with some natives feasting on cooked camas, "they nearly blew me out of the hut".

My attempts to slow cook Jerusalem artichokes didn't work in gas reduction for me unfortunately.

[macmex]

What seems to work for me is boiling them at least twice. The water turns bright green, and I believe it leaches out some of that ioline. At any rate it has helped me to eat them.

Stevil, that is a most interesting article on "guts & grease." I greatly appreciated it, though he seemed to make a kind of leap from logic in his argument, at the end when somehow he slipped in the promotion of unpasteurized milk. I didn't understand how "unpasteurized" fit in with the rest of the paper. Nevertheless, it was a good one. Thanks!

George

[Alan]

In all honesty, this might just be the most interesting conversation that has taken place on this message board, ever.

[macmex]

It is simply fascinating how a given group of people can knock around an issue and come up with so much "cross pollination"

Probably the thing that so fascinates me with Sunchokes is the fact that I could plant them in April and basically forget about them. Here in Oklahoma (Ok, I'll be back there soon) most anything forgotten gets overrun with Bermuda and Johnson's grass (and that very quickly during hot weather). Yet this plant fended for itself, out competing such aggressive weeds. Then, when I dug them, lo and behold they out produced any other root crop I have grown, by a long shot.

To top things off. They actually taste really good! If it wasn't for this ioline/flatulence issue I think they could be promoted as a major answer to feeding the poor. I thought this link was already somewhere on here. But I don't find it:

tinyurl.com/343yoz

There is an obscure comment about day length sensitivity in there, which makes me wonder if it won't produce other than in the temperate parts of the world. For years I worked, helping rural folk in the sierra, here in Mexico, to better their nutrition. This plant, if it would produce, could be a true God send for many.

When I dig these I just can't get over how much FOOD they produce!