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"How can a nation be great if its bread tastes like Kleenex?" ~
~ Julia Child
Do you reckon Julia Child's question in the quote above would mean the same thing if the word "bread" were replaced by the term "money"? It amuses me to playfully imagine an advanced civilization like America not having toilet paper because the economy failed. Such that the pulp mills and paper mills shut down for lack of operating capital, and the citizens had to find different ways to complete their toilette.
Without any toilet paper, any carefully hidden cache of Kleenex would soon be worth much more than it's weight in gold and thus earn the aphorism "As good as money." for it's capitalistic sobriquet. America would develop even more obese people than currently. They'd have to stop defecating because they never learned how to wipe their ass without toilet paper. Been to Mexico? Toilet paper is a totally different story down there.
The current indigenous kinsmen of the ancient Mayans would be rolling in the aisles and growing three crops of maize a year if they knew about this situation. More for the corn cobs than the corn. In my most catastrophic visions I see piles and piles of used corn cobs on every corner and doorway of the cities of the Northeast. Suddenly, New York city would begin to live up to the odoriferous reputation of Paris.
The current indigenous kinsmen of the ancient Mayans would be rolling in the aisles and growing three crops of maize a year if they knew about this situation. More for the corn cobs than the corn. In my most catastrophic visions I see piles and piles of used corn cobs on every corner and doorway of the cities of the Northeast. Suddenly, New York city would begin to live up to the odoriferous reputation of Paris.
I've been reading some more web articles regarding the fermentation of food. Fermentation is merely one of the ways food is and was preserved prior to the invention of refrigeration. The more I read about fermentation, the more I realize it's always been a part of my life. Most recently a food I've been eating for a couple of decades without knowing fermentation is what makes it special is miso. I truly love the taste of miso. It makes every food I mix it with tastier. Soy sauce not withstanding.
Life is a little slow for me today. I've been waiting to get some water kefir grains in the mail from Texas. They didn't come. I was afraid the mailman that delivers Priority Mail wouldn't find my house back in the woods easily, so I painted a little sign with my address on it and nailed it to a pine tree where my driveway exits the sandy lane from the paved road.
The weather has been so hot I'm afraid the kefir grains will be exposed to enough heat to kill them before they get here. It's the same worry I've had with the milk kefir grains I ordered from Michigan over the internet. Here is the link if you're interested in such things:
http://www.yemoos.com/mainmilkkefir.html
I ordered from this site because some person from Hawaii wrote to the discussion list about how satisfied he was with his purchase from this homesteading couple. The guy there acknowledged my order with an e-mail, and I wrote back and told him of my concerns about the hot weather. I asked him to send the granules to my youngest brother's business address because it's air conditioned, and there is someone always there during business hours. He's an amiable dude, and agreed to do that.
The original arrangement I had to get some milk kefir grains locally might still come through, but these people are so busy. In addition, the guy who actually has the milk kefir grains is sick with kidney stones. He has already tried to provide me with some, but in my ignorance I didn't do right. By the time I felt comfortable that I could use them correctly the situation had changed.
Today I've been reading about a Peruvian plant called Yacon:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yacón
A woman on the discussion list sent me a link about it when I asked if anybody in the group used inulin and what they thought about it. The link she provided had a technical article that was difficult for me to wade through, but it was interesting and I finally resorted to using the text-to-speech feature on my Mac to try to grasp the meaning of the article.
Next, I Googled up "yacon" and the results page provided the Wikipedia link I offer above, and a lot of pictures of the roots and stems of the green plant. Wikipedia promptly pointed out that the active ingredient of the yacon plant was indeed inulin, and the Indians make a syrup from the roots and a potent antioxidant tea from the leaves in Bolivia.
The information I encountered reading about yacon listed pretty much the same data written about chicory root inulin and Jerusalem artichoke inulin. Namely, that the most potent aspect of inulin (sometime called "diabetic's sugar") is that it is not digested in the stomach or the small intestine, but passes through directly to the large intestine where it breaks down into useable nutrients via fermentation.
The importance of this is that inulin only nourishes the friendly bacteria in the large intestine, and that many times nutrients the friendly bacteria need to be fruitful and multiply in order to balance the total bacterial community in the large intestine gets eaten up by stomach acid and the chemical interplay of digestion in the small intestine. Inulin also has 6 grams of soluble dietary fiber per teaspoon.
Theoretically, the object of me consuming a couple of teaspoons of inulin in my hot coffee and oatmeal is to feed the friendly gut bacteria in my large intestine so that it can use the calcium my bones need and manufacture a lotta B vitamins to complete my nutritional balancing act. I like imagining that's what's happening in my GI tract anyway. I'll be happy with the kefir grains arrive, and even happier if they're still alive after such a long journey.
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