Baking bread using 4,500 year old yeast from Ancient Egyptian pottery (2019)(twitter.com)
twitter.com
Baking bread using 4,500 year old yeast from Ancient Egyptian pottery (2019)
https://twitter.com/SeamusBlackley/status/1158264819503419392
75 comments
If I ever become wealthy, one of the things I'd love to do is fund a culinary museum. Imagine rotating exhibits where visitors can try samples of historical cuisines from around the world. Of course most of them would be loose approximations of the dishes, and no idea if it's financially viable, but still. It would be a ton of fun.
Epcot at Disney World is like that (or at least used to be like that the last time I went 20 years ago).
I agree - and might reveal that our diet these days is pretty amazing.
Someone elaborated on the cultural marvel that is the humble American hamburger: that a food made of ground beef, bread, pickle, lettuce, tomato, and a couple sauces - most are rapidly perishable items - can be made on demand, year-round, for the incredibly low cost of one dollar is absolutely amazing.
dirkg(4)
I would argue that a hamburger costing only $1 is very loosely using the ingredients you think it is.
I hate to say this, but McDonalds offerings appear to have gotten somewhat decent as of late, with regards to McDonald's/Fast Food in general. It's still trash... but I think it's closer to real ingredients than it has been for quite some time.
If we don't see a decade of economic downturn, in 1-2 decades McDonald's may turn into something decently healthy/acceptable, once again in the sense of still being fast food.
We could however see the dystopia of McDonald's only accepting fixed amount of meme doge tokens that go on to hyperinflate, and we'll all be able to shake our fists about how we were promised flying cars but got DogeDonalds
If we don't see a decade of economic downturn, in 1-2 decades McDonald's may turn into something decently healthy/acceptable, once again in the sense of still being fast food.
We could however see the dystopia of McDonald's only accepting fixed amount of meme doge tokens that go on to hyperinflate, and we'll all be able to shake our fists about how we were promised flying cars but got DogeDonalds
Maybe we’ll have the Demolition Man future where Taco Bell is the only surviving restaurant.
As long as we don't use the 3 seashells.
dylan604(1)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oagmlbhobnY&t=11s
This guy thinks the Big Mac should cost $200
This guy thinks the Big Mac should cost $200
You’d be wrong. Ingredient quality wise McDonald’s is fine. The issue is how much oil/salt they use
You'd be wrong in assuming I was thinking about McDonalds in the first place. You took it there, not me. There are plenty of other fast food chains with a $1 menu with subpar food. Why are you projecting?
> the incredibly low cost of one dollar is absolutely amazing.
It's remarkable indeed. However, this can be the case only because we don't pay for externalities (including high emissions of CO2, barbaric exploitation of animals). This model isn't sustainable.
It's remarkable indeed. However, this can be the case only because we don't pay for externalities (including high emissions of CO2, barbaric exploitation of animals). This model isn't sustainable.
Even better, you can fund one today:
https://www.mofad.org/
Oh jeez, I'd never heard of this and I lived in the city for years. This is amazing, thanks!
Seconding MOFAD, it is great.
Or even: https://disgustingfoodmuseum.com/
I have to say for Sweden of all countries to open a museum making fun of other culture's cuisines makes me think of "Don't throw bricks when you live in a glass house."
I’ll agree with the Swedes. The examples of food such as Korean child feces wine isn’t going to be easily beaten by anything the Swedes make.
Some of the descriptions of the food with stories are pretty funny.
> A German landlord evicted a tenant without notice after he opened a can of surströmming in the apartment building’s stairwell. When the landlord was taken to court, the court ruled that the termination was justified when the landlord’s attorney demonstrated their case by opening a can inside the courtroom.
Some of the descriptions of the food with stories are pretty funny.
> A German landlord evicted a tenant without notice after he opened a can of surströmming in the apartment building’s stairwell. When the landlord was taken to court, the court ruled that the termination was justified when the landlord’s attorney demonstrated their case by opening a can inside the courtroom.
https://disgustingfoodmuseum.com/most-disgusting-foods-in-th... includes that one Swedish food you may be thinking of...
wow, I'm rather surprised that I've had 4 of these, and have enjoyed them. likely not enough to try the other 21.
Stinky tofu doesn't really belong to that list, I think. It was pretty yummy.
amusingly, stinky tofu wasn't one of the 4 I've had.
Were I to become wealthy, I would want to build a "self sufficient" community that fostered art and education, and use that as a template for more of the same. Of course easier said than done, but it damn it would be rewarding.
> I'm Emotional
> Update: my wife is decimating the Egyptian bread.
Partnership in a sentence if I've ever heard it.
> Update: my wife is decimating the Egyptian bread.
Partnership in a sentence if I've ever heard it.
Was an improper use of the word decimate, which means to kill 1/10th of an army. He likely meant to use annihilate.
That’s a cromulent usage of decimate https://www.merriam-webster.com/words-at-play/the-original-d...
If this is of interest to you, I recommend looking at Ed Wood:
https://sourdo.com/classic-sourdoughs-book/
https://thechalkboardmag.com/sweet-on-sour-ed-wood-on-the-an...
He was in National Geographic Magazine, January, 1995 discussing this as well. I have two of his cultures for sourdough and they work great!
https://sourdo.com/classic-sourdoughs-book/
https://thechalkboardmag.com/sweet-on-sour-ed-wood-on-the-an...
He was in National Geographic Magazine, January, 1995 discussing this as well. I have two of his cultures for sourdough and they work great!
I've read that a sourdough culture is truly a local product in the sense that the community in your jar quickly changes in accordance to the environment it is in (e.g. your kitchen) and what you feed it with. So it does not really matter where you get your initial culture or whether you start one by yourself, as within a week or so of frequent feeding the culture has converged to your very own unique distribution of strains of yeast and bacteria.
I personally tried a few times to jumpstart my own sourdough culture, and it all ended in failure. The cultures I have now have been extremely robust (I have left them alone for 2 months, and in 2 days they are back to live as is nothing happened).
So I don't know if that is the case, I just know that the cultures I was given worked incredibly well.
So I don't know if that is the case, I just know that the cultures I was given worked incredibly well.
I don't think this is true. I have a culture that is about three years old. It really hasn't changed. The flavor is the same. If you don't handle your culture with some care to proper food handling safety then you probably will get some funk going but in my experience that funk turns to junk shortly thereafter and you're 'starting' over.
My culture is about 10 years old, split off one of my fathers. Every so often I check his - it looks, smells and tastes different.
I strongly believe that the flour you feed it changes the culture.
I don’t really look after mine though. I top it up occasionally, and it always works, even after months.
I find it vaguely amusing every time I see an article of book on caring for your starter. It doesn’t need much, and if a few millennia in a dried out pot doesn’t prove that, nothing will.
I strongly believe that the flour you feed it changes the culture.
I don’t really look after mine though. I top it up occasionally, and it always works, even after months.
I find it vaguely amusing every time I see an article of book on caring for your starter. It doesn’t need much, and if a few millennia in a dried out pot doesn’t prove that, nothing will.
I don't do anything to mine as well. It sits in the fridge for weeks at a time. But I do use the exact same flour.
I appreciate that he used Kamut, which is a trade name for a cereal brought back from Egypt to Montana, United States, by a soldier who was stationed there.
The berries are much larger than wheat, if I recall correctly they called it "pharaoh's wheat" before adopting the Kamut moniker. Nowadays it's mostly a product of Montana- a very different climate from the Nile valley.
The berries are much larger than wheat, if I recall correctly they called it "pharaoh's wheat" before adopting the Kamut moniker. Nowadays it's mostly a product of Montana- a very different climate from the Nile valley.
The plant itself is called Khorasan Wheat, you can find Khorasan flour that is not branded as Kamut.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Khorasan_wheat
Somewhat unrelated, but my wife has recently found a way to make _awesome_ European (aka actually edible) bread at home, using a very simple recipe. The protip is you need to bake it in a well pre-heated Dutch oven, that's how you get the crust right. Commercial ovens inject steam for the same purpose, but you can't do that at home. Dutch oven apparently simulates the same effect. A $5 loaf of "fancy" bread can be baked at home easily with ~50c worth of ingredients. She used this book to figure this out: https://www.amazon.com/Tartine-Bread-Chad-Robertson/dp/08118.... She tried numerous recipes from it (some of which were ridiculously elaborate), but the simplest and least time consuming one turned out to also be the best, not to mention the most practical on the day-to-day basis.
Using a dutch oven is indeed a fantastic way to get a lovely crust and good oven spring in your bread! I often will mist the loaf before putting it in which I find helps a little with a good rise.
I do occasionally like to make longer loaves such as baguettes which aren’t really easy to fit inside of a dutch oven, especially if I am using a forming pan. One method I have used to get good oven spring and a nice crust at home in those cases is to place a large cast iron griddle on the bottom rack of the oven, and a few minutes before baking, placing a pan of water—a square bread pan works great for this—on it and wait for it to come to a visible simmer. The cast iron does a good job of retaining and re-radiating heat quickly after opening the oven, and the pan of water adds enough steam into the baking chamber to help get a good rise during the bake. Bake on a middle rack of the oven and remove the pan of water after 10-12 minutes of baking to finish the bake with a dry oven, and you’ll still end up with good color and a nice, crunchy crust.
This method has worked pretty well in a variety of standard electric home ovens new and old that I’ve used over the years.
And 100% agreed on simple recipes being best! The loaves I’ve made with just flour, water, salt, and yeast have tended to be the crowd-pleasers. Thousands of years of bread and beer being diet staples have definitely made their mark, I suppose.
I do occasionally like to make longer loaves such as baguettes which aren’t really easy to fit inside of a dutch oven, especially if I am using a forming pan. One method I have used to get good oven spring and a nice crust at home in those cases is to place a large cast iron griddle on the bottom rack of the oven, and a few minutes before baking, placing a pan of water—a square bread pan works great for this—on it and wait for it to come to a visible simmer. The cast iron does a good job of retaining and re-radiating heat quickly after opening the oven, and the pan of water adds enough steam into the baking chamber to help get a good rise during the bake. Bake on a middle rack of the oven and remove the pan of water after 10-12 minutes of baking to finish the bake with a dry oven, and you’ll still end up with good color and a nice, crunchy crust.
This method has worked pretty well in a variety of standard electric home ovens new and old that I’ve used over the years.
And 100% agreed on simple recipes being best! The loaves I’ve made with just flour, water, salt, and yeast have tended to be the crowd-pleasers. Thousands of years of bread and beer being diet staples have definitely made their mark, I suppose.
You can steam up the Dutch oven by chucking in a few ice cubes as the loaf goes into the pot.
I generally put the load into the pot on a bit of baking paper (to save my knuckles touching the hot pot) and I put ice cubes into the pot, down the side of the paper so that water doesn’t pool under the dough.
Probably not need to a baker, but if you add a bit of fat (butter or oil) and some honey you can get a thick, dark crust and tasty crust.
I generally put the load into the pot on a bit of baking paper (to save my knuckles touching the hot pot) and I put ice cubes into the pot, down the side of the paper so that water doesn’t pool under the dough.
Probably not need to a baker, but if you add a bit of fat (butter or oil) and some honey you can get a thick, dark crust and tasty crust.
I started baking bread after coming across this article on HN https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22625590
I found it to be a nice, accessible way to get started, with clear and simple instructions. Later on I cultivated a sourdough starter and am using that instead of instant yeast, but still following the same steps. (One learning point that took me too long to realize is that everything becomes much easier if you use high protein flour, more rise. Healthier starter.)
Yes, read up on varieties of flour used by professional bakers and buy some on online instead of your local super market (hint most supermarkets don't even have the right flour). It makes a lot of difference. Alternatively, find some local mill and source from there. It's worth the extra money. Also learn about the different ways flour is processed at industrial scale. Basically bleaching and sterilization are two things you don't want as a home baker. You can make it work if you really have nothing else but why go through the trouble?
Another good tip is to feed your starter with whole wheat or rye flour. It has more nutrition and especially Reye has a lot of natural sugars in it too.
There are a lot of recipes out there obsessing about weights, timings, etc. The important thing to realize is that you need to adjust those numbers to the flour used, the ambient temperature, humidity, the state your starter is in when you start, and probably a dozen other factors. In other words the numbers are not actually that important and you can totally wing it if you know what you are doing.
The importance of measuring is not repeating what the recipe says but doing the same things consistently between bakes and adjusting as you go in a semi data-driven way. In my case, I take 60 grams of starter (which is 50/50 water and flour) and add 70 grams of water and flour to make what is known as a levain (basically a glass of starter that I let ferment on the counter). The rest of the starter is replenished and goes back in the fridge.
The significant thing here is that I end up with a 100 grams of flour and a 100 grams of water. These are just nice numbers to work with when I have to calculate the hydration. That's the only reason for those numbers. Cup measurements are not precise enough, even if you are in the US. Using volumetric measurements for weight has a very high margin of error in a process with a low tolerance for exactly that.
How high you can push your hydration is a function of what flour you use and how much skill you have handling the dough. Too low and you end up with a brick instead of a bread. Too high and you're making focacia instead of a nice puffy bread. This is why you want to get the right flour. It will allow you to push the hydration higher. Also the flavor profile benefits. Good flour makes things easier and tastier.
Another good tip is to feed your starter with whole wheat or rye flour. It has more nutrition and especially Reye has a lot of natural sugars in it too.
There are a lot of recipes out there obsessing about weights, timings, etc. The important thing to realize is that you need to adjust those numbers to the flour used, the ambient temperature, humidity, the state your starter is in when you start, and probably a dozen other factors. In other words the numbers are not actually that important and you can totally wing it if you know what you are doing.
The importance of measuring is not repeating what the recipe says but doing the same things consistently between bakes and adjusting as you go in a semi data-driven way. In my case, I take 60 grams of starter (which is 50/50 water and flour) and add 70 grams of water and flour to make what is known as a levain (basically a glass of starter that I let ferment on the counter). The rest of the starter is replenished and goes back in the fridge.
The significant thing here is that I end up with a 100 grams of flour and a 100 grams of water. These are just nice numbers to work with when I have to calculate the hydration. That's the only reason for those numbers. Cup measurements are not precise enough, even if you are in the US. Using volumetric measurements for weight has a very high margin of error in a process with a low tolerance for exactly that.
How high you can push your hydration is a function of what flour you use and how much skill you have handling the dough. Too low and you end up with a brick instead of a bread. Too high and you're making focacia instead of a nice puffy bread. This is why you want to get the right flour. It will allow you to push the hydration higher. Also the flavor profile benefits. Good flour makes things easier and tastier.
>Basically bleaching and sterilization are two things you don't want as a home baker. You can make it work if you really have nothing else but why go through the trouble?
Hard disagree. Bleached flour is much easier to work with for the home/inexperienced baker. Hydrates easily, dough tends to be less tacky, better volume etc. It's only when you've got the basics down and want to get into the weeds with details that I'd recommend getting into specialty flours that are less likely to be chemically bleached.
Hard disagree. Bleached flour is much easier to work with for the home/inexperienced baker. Hydrates easily, dough tends to be less tacky, better volume etc. It's only when you've got the basics down and want to get into the weeds with details that I'd recommend getting into specialty flours that are less likely to be chemically bleached.
I just got done feeding my first attempts at making a starter from scratch. One thing I didn't realize is how important it is to clean all of the discarded starter from every surface while its still wet. It's kinda messy haha.
Oh yeah that stuff is like concrete when it dries up. Already had to replace my bin. Good luck with your starter, exciting! Mine is a year and a half old now. Amazing how it just keeps going
> Commercial ovens inject steam for the same purpose, but you can't do that at home. Dutch oven apparently simulates the same effect.
At least in the UK, consumer ovens are available (starting at the low-mid end) with water reservoirs and a steam function.
But you don't need that, if you don't have a casserole (aka 'Dutch oven') you can put a tray over the bread, and a container of water underneath. Remove them when you'd remove the casserole lid.
I bake a loaf slightly more often than weekly, and do this occasionally because my casserole isn't large enough, and usually squashes the top flat.
At least in the UK, consumer ovens are available (starting at the low-mid end) with water reservoirs and a steam function.
But you don't need that, if you don't have a casserole (aka 'Dutch oven') you can put a tray over the bread, and a container of water underneath. Remove them when you'd remove the casserole lid.
I bake a loaf slightly more often than weekly, and do this occasionally because my casserole isn't large enough, and usually squashes the top flat.
> in the UK, consumer ovens are available (starting at the low-mid end) with water reservoirs and a steam function.
Same here in Norway so I suspect that they must be available all over Europe as they are made by companies like AEG, Miele, and so on. They aren't even desperately expensive any more.
But I bake a loaf in a cast iron casserole at 250 C in a conventional oven. Lid on for the first half hour, take off the lid and bake for a further 15 minutes. Makes a nice crust.
Same here in Norway so I suspect that they must be available all over Europe as they are made by companies like AEG, Miele, and so on. They aren't even desperately expensive any more.
But I bake a loaf in a cast iron casserole at 250 C in a conventional oven. Lid on for the first half hour, take off the lid and bake for a further 15 minutes. Makes a nice crust.
Yep I do the same. Though I've been erring shorter with the lid on (and experimenting with a tray of water as I mentioned) trying to save it from being squashed.. really I should just buy a bigger casserole! (And a bigger kitchen with space for it when not in use..)
Here is a short video series about the process https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y0owQi_U44c&list=PLWqTac5vy0...
> We took many samples and will continue to build our sample library over the next year or so. This is important as we need to learn which microorganisms are old and which are modern contaminants.
I wonder if there's an update on how this went, and if they were able to show that this was actually an ancient yeast, not just a modern sourdough starter.
I wonder if there's an update on how this went, and if they were able to show that this was actually an ancient yeast, not just a modern sourdough starter.
In-depth interview here: https://www.alieward.com/ologies/gastroegyptology
I don't really get the point of the sterilized equipment. Surely if anything is going to contaminate the experiment with modern yeast, it's the freshly milled flour.
Presumably you'd want to test the active starter to see if the ancient strains of yeast took hold.
Edit: nevermind, I missed that the flour was sterilized too.
Presumably you'd want to test the active starter to see if the ancient strains of yeast took hold.
Edit: nevermind, I missed that the flour was sterilized too.
Past related threads:
A Conversation with the Team That Made Bread with Ancient Egyptian Yeast - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20649495 - Aug 2019 (16 comments)
Baking bread from a 4,500-year-old yeast from Ancient Egyptian pottery - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20624396 - Aug 2019 (16 comments)
A Conversation with the Team That Made Bread with Ancient Egyptian Yeast - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20649495 - Aug 2019 (16 comments)
Baking bread from a 4,500-year-old yeast from Ancient Egyptian pottery - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20624396 - Aug 2019 (16 comments)
If you like this you may enjoy the YouTube channel "Tasting History" https://youtube.com/c/TastingHistory
So it's been two years now since this was done. Where can we buy our ancient Egyptian yeast?
Fun fact, the author of the thread can be considered the father of XBox https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seamus_Blackley
The posts are from before they lab-tested if it was contaminated; and no news since aug 2019? Likely, it was contaminated and not ancient.
Yeast/bacteria is everywhere. Any flour/grain can be turned into sourdough. The "feeding/culling" process ensures whatever strain is strongest/adapted survives that day.
Yeast/bacteria is everywhere. Any flour/grain can be turned into sourdough. The "feeding/culling" process ensures whatever strain is strongest/adapted survives that day.