Sprouting 35 Year Old Wheat Berries

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Last week we were given some #10 cans of wheat that had been packed in the 1970’s without the use of any oxygen absorbers.  This wheat had not been stored under the best conditions, the cans were rusty from have been recently stored outside under a tarp.  We found the rustiest, nastiest looking can in the bunch and opened it. The wheat looked fine, so we decided to see if it would sprout.

We have a Victorio 4 tray seed sprouter that we had picked up at Emergency Essentials in Utah.  It was still new in the wrapper so we decided this was a good chance to try it. The wheat berries were placed in the trays and water added.  The directions were easy to follow and took very little work. Anyway, to make a long story short, this morning the wheat is sprouting.  I don’t think we will get 100% to sprout but a fair amount is sprouting.  For wheat this old and stored under adverse conditions, I think this is really good results and shows just how well wheat stores.

If you don’t have a sprouter, you can use a mason jar and some cheesecloth.  Thoroughly wash 1/4 cup of wheat berries.  Place the berries in a dish or jar and cover with water.  Let them sit overnight in a cool place, then drain and rinse the wheat

The Victorio 4 Tray Seed Sprouter

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Place the wheat in a clean mason jar and cover the top with two layers of cheesecloth.  Fasten the cheesecloth on the jar with a screw top canning jar lid ring.  Lay the jar on its side in a warm dark place (68 degrees-75 degrees F). Each day, rinse the sprouts by pouring lukewarm water into the jar.  Shake the jar wetting all the grain kernels, then drain off the water.  The grain should sprout in three or four days,  Once grains have sprouted, keep refrigerated till served.

See also  Evaporated and Condensed Milk

Howard

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12 thoughts on “Sprouting 35 Year Old Wheat Berries”

  1. You can use wheat berries to make bread. First you need to grind them. We have a hand grinder and also a food processor. The hand grinder is a lot of work and will not grind as fine as the food processor, but we feel it’s important to get used to using our equipment.

    The bread will be pretty heavy-so much so that eating sandwiches open faced would be enough.

    1. My research has directed me that once the wheat berries little tails, it turns into a vegetable with very little gluten. Back in the day, they used to lay the wheat out on tarps in the late summer interprets to dry it. In the morning the dude cover the weed and after a few days it would grow tails and then eventually dry. Back then, the bread was good for you. Nowadays with industrialization, they no longer Sprout the wheat and that is why it is making people sick.

  2. It is a new thing, on a lot of the blogs they are referring to them as wheat berries. I think it comes from the health food stores.
    Howard

  3. Spent 7 years with the Canadian Grain Commission. It is plain wheat and “wheat berries” seems to be a made-up term now being commonly used. Farmers and industry have never used this term but for some reason it’s being marketed as such.

  4. I bought wheat berries a year ago which are still in the box. If they are not full of wheedles when I open the box would they still be okay to grind for flour or put into long term storage using Mylar bags? Or just too old?

  5. Is there any nutritional value in the wheat if it will not sprout? We have 45 year old wheat that was nitrogen packed.

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