With this article we begin the second installment of our series on ‘ancient wheats’. In this series we are examining einkorn, emmer, spelt, and common wheat: all members of the Triticum genus. With the domestication of these grains our human ancestors, beginning during the Neolithic Period (approx 8000BC), began moving from a predominantly nomadic hunter-gather existence to a more settled lifestyle. Before we continue with our review of the ‘ancient’ wheats perhaps an overview of the grains we’re studying:

It has been pointed out that the history of the hulled wheats is, to a considerable extent, the history of agriculture. In the first part of this series we saw that einkorn, perhaps the first of the domesticated grains, had its origin in the fertile crescent: a region encompassing modern day Iran, Iraq, Jordan, Syria and Palestine, the region most often identified with as the birth place of modern agriculture. Both emmer and einkorn have their wild antecedents: T dicoccoides and T. boeticum and both are still to found in this region. As discussed earlier, one of the key improvements that distinguishes the domesticated forms from the wild forms is the ability for the grain to remain on the plant until harvest. If the grain falls to the ground before it can be gathered it is of little use as a source of human nutrition.

Wild emmer grows (to this day) in the fertile crescent of the Near East. From the chart above you can see that emmer is classified as a tetraploid wheat (4 sets of chromosomes) that was formed by the hybridization of two diploid grasses T. urartu and another unidentified diploid grass. Emmer, like einkorn and spelt is a hulled wheat, mean that it protective glumes(hulls) remain intact on the kernel and must be mechanically removed before the grain can be processed. This is in contrast to modern wheat (T aestivum) which is free threshing, meaning the glumes are easily removed during harvest.

Emmer, like einkorn, was being grown and harvested right from the beginning of agriculture: 8000-7800BC (10,000 years ago) with the widespread appearance of farming sites appearing around 7000BC. Emmer and barley were in widespread use in the middle-east, the far east, Europe and North Africa from the Stone Age (8000BC) through the Bronze Age (4000BC). Emmer, as too with einkorn continued to be grown through the Bronze Age but by around 3000BC it was being sporadically replaced by the free threshing wheats.

In Egypt, where farming villages did not appear until around 6000BC, emmer was the sole wheat cultivated from the beginning of farming in that region until after the conquest of Alexander the Great in 332BC after which a rapid switch to T. durum took place. As you will note, the presence of emmer in Eqypt remained long after its decline elsewhere in the Mediterranean region, and, in fact, it took the presence of a foreign power to initiate the change. While there is no solid evidence as to why the Egyptian cultivation of emmer lasted so long after its decline elsewhere, it appears to be mostly due to a cultural attachment to it is a food source. Herodotus quotes the Egyptians amongst whom he lived from 495-425BC as saying emmer is ‘the only fit cereal for bread.’ The Egyptians most certainly used emmer in baking but it is unclear whether it was leavened or not.

In our current age emmer is only grown in limited areas of the Balkans, Italy, Spain, Iran, Turkey and India and in very small quantities in the United States. While modern interest in emmer in developed countries springs from a renewed interest in the ancient grains, in less developed regions of the world emmer can be a good niche crop where it often outperforms modern wheats on marginal lands where few crop inputs are used. Said another way, emmer can become a viable crop in regions where no other grain can economically be grown. Where low input techniques such as organic farming are used emmer shows good potential. Emmer can ‘self-regulate’ weeds due its high tillering rate, and typically does not benefit from the application of nitrogenous fertilizers.

The composition of emmer, while similar to that of einkorn, is markedly different from modern wheats and is a good indication of the effect that 1000’s of years of controlled breeding and improvement have had on free threshing wheats. The protein content of emmer is quite variable within a range of 8.7% to 18% but on average emmer contains a higher percentage of protein than modern wheat when cultivated under similar conditions. This is especially true when both emmer and modern wheat are grown without the use of nitrogenous fertilizer. Under these conditions modern wheat is unable to develop to its full potential.

Even with relatively high protein contents, emmer when used alone is, largely, unsuitable for making breads that appeal to modern tastes. The principle proteins obtained from wheat that are involved in bread making are gliadin and glutenin (see this article for a further discussion of these proteins). The glutenins are responsible for the elastic characteristic of the dough while the gliadin subunits are responsible for the extensible characteristic. It is the ratio of gliadin to glutenin that determines the ultimate suitability of a flour (or grain in our case) for use in the production of leavened bread. Modern hard wheats have a gliadin to glutinen ration of approximately 1:1 indicating that there is a good balance between extensibility and elasticity. Emmer, on the other hand, has a gliadin to glutenin ratio of 6 to 1. Indicating that doughs made with emmer flour are going to be extremely extensible and difficult to work with in the production of leavened breads.

As from the theoretical there is, in fact, very little information regarding the suitability of emmer for bread making. From the few tests that have been performed emmer breads typically exhibited lower baking quality than both spelt and soft wheat flours. However, emmer breads had a very desirable and unique flavor, indicating that while it may not be suitable to make breads with 100% emmer flour, emmer may, in fact be a very nice addition to breads made with hard wheats, which are often characterized as lacking in flavor.

While emmer is currently grown as a niche crop, mostly in isolated areas around the world, it has several characteristics that would indicate it suitability for more widespread production, especially as world demand (and need) for organically and sustainably produced crops increases. The fact that emmer can outperform modern wheats on marginal land with low to no crop inputs highlights its suitability as a crop for organic production. And while it perhaps is not ideal for use at 100% levels in the baking of bread, its desirable flavor contributions could justify its inclusion in most formulas. But, at present, sourcing of both whole emmer kernels and milled emmer flour is a major factor hindering its more widespread adoption as a bread making grain.

A great source for information concerning the hulled wheat can be found here: Hulled Wheat: The Proceedings of the First International Workshop on Hulled Wheats: July 21-22, 2005

Another source of information for these articles:Alternative Wheat Cereals as Food Grains: Einkorn, Emmer, Spelt, Kamut, and Triticale

And the book ‘Specialty Grains for Food and Feed’, American Association of Cereal Chemists, 2005.

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