Freekeh, the oddly named grain, may seem yet another modern Middle Eastern menu trend; but the greenish-coloured, wild, smoked wheat has an ancient history and a surprising story.
Farmers in the region have been harvesting this grain since biblical times — it even gets a reference in the Bible as a “parched grain”. “It’s mentioned in the Book of Ruth” says Ruth Nieman, author of Freekeh Wild Wheat & Ancient Grains who explains that this parched grain is also “distinguished as smoky green kernels of freekeh, the long-established staple of the region’s diet.”
Why though would you harvest unripe, green wheat? Nieman explains that there was a practical reason, at a time when the best way to destroy your enemies was to annihilate their food source. “As an insurance policy in case a swarm of insects, hot winds or their enemies devastated the crop, farmers would pick half of the wheat while unripe, and leave the rest to grow to full maturity.”
The discovery that burning the unripe wheat produced a (more than) palatable food was an unhappy accident. Around the time of the first millennium, unharvested wheat fields across the Eastern Mediterranean were regularly set alight by pirates (the Sea Peoples of Aegean tribes) in an effort to destroy trade routes and local livelihoods.
Where the worst had happened and the crops were burning, the farmers tried to salvage the burnt husks by vigorously rubbing the burnt skins, which revealed an edible greenish tinged grain. “In those days they’d eat anything remotely edible as food was often scarce.”
Discovering that the now smoky-flavoured, inner grain was not only tasty but also nutritious, farmers went on to repeat this process. “Nowadays, farmers across the region harvest their unripe crops, leave them to dry for a day and then smoke the husks on cast iron frames over burning thorns or other vegetation and then rub the husks with a contraption. It’s a very dusty process — the blackened chaff covers everything.”
“When you buy freekeh you need to soak it and rinse it well to get rid of the remaining charred husk” explains Nieman, whose first (award-winning) cookery book, The Galilean Kitchen, detailed Israeli and Arab home cooking of the Galilean region.
She also explains that freekeh is mostly farmed by Arab farmers. “It’s a main staple of Arabic communities and becoming more so in Israeli communities. It’s also farmed across the region, in Lebanon, Egypt and possibly Turkey.”
There’s good reason for its resurgence, not only is it tasty and can be used in a variety of dishes, but it’s low in gluten. “It’s not gluten free, but as it is picked so early in the ripening process, the gluten hasn’t had time to develop and so is much lower, and will not give you that bloated, full feeling that higher gluten grains can. It’s also considered a super grain because it’s packed with prebiotic fibres, vitamins and minerals and has a high fibre content. It’s considered a good carb.”
Nieman suggests using freekeh in a number of ways: in salads; ground to a flour to make pastry and breads and in risottos and pilaffs. “You can buy freekeh at Holland Barratt; Planet Organic; at continental shops like Theo (a chain) and online. The smokier the kernels smell in the packet, the fresher the grain.”
Ruth Nieman is the author of Freekeh, Wild Wheats and Grains, recipes for healthy eating (Prospect Books)
Read more about Ruth here
