Eco-Photo

I don’t know that I’ll ever eat white grits again. Being from the Carolinas, Ken and I were brought up on white grits and have loved them dearly. But recently we tried some of Bob’s Red Mill stone milled corn grits, which are yellow. Yellow grits include the whole kernel where white grits use hulled kernels. We were amazed to find that yellow grits taste better, are easier to cook, and are more nutritional than white grits. Plus, we can fry up the leftovers to make some lovely polenta. I know the South loves it traditions, but I think they need to try yellow grits.

Anyhow, I promised in my February newsletter that I’d give more information from my tour of Bob’s Red Mill. Stone milling was the method used for thousands of years until the introduction of roller mill machines in the 1880’s. Roller mill machines became popular because they produced a fine, white, fluffy grain that did not quickly turn rancid or attract bugs. Unfortunately, white flour has less nutritional value. It’s widespread use increased the instances of nutritional deficiencies, so mills began to enrich the flour with vitamins and minerals in the 1940’s. Another reason stone milled grains are more nutritious is because stone milling is considered a slow cool milling method.  This slow cool method allows the natural enzymes to live in the grains, where the roller mill machines kill the enzymes because of the heat generated by the rollers.

Here is a small gallery of photos from my tour of Bob’s Red Mill. Since 97% of their products are shipped to grocery stores around the world, you may be able to find Bob’s grains at your local grocer or food co-op. Bob’s Red Mill has a big reputation for the many types of gluten free products he produces which include gluten free pizza dough mix and gluten free brownie mix. On the tour I learned that gluten free grains have to be ground in a completely separate facility from wheat grains because of cross contamination issues.

I found a few quotes from Bob online that sum up the stone milling process: “With all the sophisticated knowledge of recent times, no machinery has yet been developed that grinds grains into flour quite as well as our flint-hard quartz millstones quarried in France and used by discriminating millers since early Roman times.” “Our well-dressed (sharpened) sets of millstones turn the highest quality wheat into a finer, better baking bread flour than all the hammer mills, steel roller mills, steel mills, or pulverizers ever built! These slow turning millstones grind the bran, endosperm, and germ (containing its nutritious wheat germ oil) into flour in a cool natural way, creating a more assimilable food.”

I also discovered that hemp seeds are more nutritious than flax seeds.  They are high in protein, omega-3, and omega-6 fatty acids.  Unlike flax seeds, our bodies can digest the hulls and they don’t need grinding before being eaten.  The sad news is they are about 2 to 3 times more expensive than flax seed. Bob’s Red Mill buys their hemp seed from Canada because hemp is not allowed to be grown in the United States. A system that illegalizes the farming of a food that is obviously healthy for us has confused its priorities.