Last year we became members of Bantry CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) group and became proud owners of some of the oats. Oats have a hard shell around them called a hull. Chickens and sheep are able to digest them whole. Cattle are happy with them if they are rolled however people prefer them dehulled. It proved impossible to find anyone to dehull them and In May we bought (with some financial help from West Cork Development Partnership), this machine from Horn in Germany. The instructions came in German, and although we were aware that it would not dehull every single groat we were initially a bit disappointed with its perfomance. Kinsale CSA brought down some of their oats, and found someone to translate the instructions. After a good afternoon playing with the settings and running the oats through a few times they started looking pretty edible.
So, we tried ours yesterday. After dehulling they were washed to float off any remaining hulls. We also put some of our own sunflower seeds through the machine which worked quite well and we added them to the oats along with a hand-full of our own dried gooseberries, and a little of Tim Rowe's honey. It was a delicious breakfast. The porridge tasted really nutty.
We would be delighted to dehull your oats for you too.
Great stuff Madeline! Glad to hear the de-huller is improving with translator assistance! The porridge looks delicious. Tom.
ReplyDeleteThat's great Madeline. .. your own home grown porridge! I was interested to read about the CSA as well. I've been trying to locate as many community based food projects and gardens as I can and have set up a facebook page, Irish Community Gardens to help with this. If it's something you might be interested in then take a look. Regards
ReplyDeleteHave you tried any naked oat varieties?
ReplyDeleteYes I have grown naked oats, about two handfuls! I will put up the pics. I definitely want to grow more. I found the garden shredder a good thresher for them.
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