Wheat Replacement From 1750 - Food Shortage - Barley Cakes
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- Опубликовано: 6 фев 2025
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Love Jon's hesitation when he undoubtedly pivoted from saying 'nutmeg' to generic 'spice' to try to avoid being lovingly poked fun at by the regulars.
I think he's distraught by the nutmeg shortage so he has to make do with alternative spices
I thought that was funny. lol
those locals will be hissing at this neighbor before you know it. with that look in their eyes. rich boy spices .....
We know what it is Jon..... we know..... 🤣😂😭💀
You know what this needs? More cowbell. And nutmeg.
The music, the setting, the cozy atmosphere, Jon's soothing voice and vibrant passion for what he does... This channel is a work of beautiful, comforting art.
John makes me feel like i’m a wise adult. I’m only 19, and i find his videos so interesting and calm. I’m currently watching this video straight after waking up at 5 am. What a great atmosphere
Same bro haha
So good to watch while having a late night toke and drink of some nice ale
@wessthemess117 you sound like that rabble rouser John Adams! To the stocks! Our Founding Fathers would be proud.
As a baker I can say that these formerly alternative grains are now the ones in short supply. Wheat flour is getting expensive but is still in the stores. Barley, rye, and oats are getting hard to find. The last barley and rye I bought was on back order for 8 weeks.
Oats aren't a problem where I live, but barley is hard to come by. I'm wondering if lockdowns didn't drive up beer consumption considerably.
You'll be seeing wheat in short supply too. Many countries, including the U.S., have smaller wheat and corn crops this year b/w droughts and lack of enough fertilizer and herbicides. Next year, the available fertilizer will be even less.
@@brick6347
lockdowns destroyed supply chains and businesses and farms
@@rennietintin8701 buy cheap popcorn in bulk and grind your own cornmeal. At our local bulk food store, the cheap popcorn is $0.79 per pound.
@@cy8905 The dent corn sold as animal feed will grind up much softer and easier to bake with.
Barley is a multi purpose grain. It can be used in so many baking and culinary applications. Those barley cakes look really good. Cheers!
Greetings, Dwayne! It's good in soups and stews.
Correct.
Barley also grows well in UK climate. I love it, chewy and nutritious. We make a sort of risotto with it, really sticks to the ribs.
One of historical foods in my country is something we call "karask" or buttermilk-barley bread. I've heard that both Ireland and Scotland have something similar in their history.
@@rosemcguinn5301 I agree. Barley is great in soups and stews. Cheers, Rose!
I love this channel! They write these “receipts” like I cook most food. When my children ask how do you make “your whatever”. I give them a list of ingredients with no measures and tell them to add ingredients until their ancestors speak to them. It is all about the taste and texture which unfortunately can be lost in translation. Thank you so much for all that each of you do.
Same! I had someone ask me for a soup recipe the other day... 🤷♀️ Well you cut the squash in half and bake it... How long? I dunno, maybe 45 minutes? I just go to it smells right. Then you saute some onions in bacon grease... How much? However much I feel like cutting up that day! And so it goes till they never ask me again. 🤣
Until the ancestors speak to them! Love it!!!
Haha - they'll be on your doorstep soon with their phone and record you doing your 'whatever' so they can recreate it 🤣
@MelDaltonMusic yep. Cooking comes from the soul. Sadly it's a dying art. Breaks my heart. I'm pretty young and I teach my kids how to cook the way my great, great grandmother cooked. I tend chicken and the garden the way she did. Fruit trees, nut trees and a bee hive is the current work. My Mamaw could raise 20 different thing in her yard but every single thing took care of something else until it made a big circle and she had little work to do for that food and she focus on sewing, canning, cooking and things like that. What happened to us?
The key thing to note is that all the grains were functionally interchangeable. My own family grew mostly wheat, but they also grew barley, rye, maize, and oats. The odds of a blight afflicting all the crops at once were much lower than the odds of any one being blighted, so it ensured something would be there for winter. The barley and oats were normally fed to the livestock over winter, but in a pinch could be used to add variety or be the emergency food for the family if the wheat crop failed.
Not functionally interchangeable across most climates or soils unfortunately; sounds like you had some pretty good soil.
@@farmerboy916 Fair point that some climates favor one grain over another, but it is not so strict. Barley, rye, oat, and wheat will grow pretty much everywhere in Europe from the lower of Italy to Scandinavia. The main thing is that people appreciated the benefits of a little variety, even if they definitely invested mostly in one.
There’s still just nothing beats a good ole fashioned Jon cooking video. All the other content is great too, but this is the best.
Barley is my favourite grain... I make an irish stew with lamb bones, celery, onion, carrot, beef stock, garlic and barley. Barley reminds me of my Mum's comfort stews and soups, she always put barley in her chicken soup... It's so good for you too.
My mother would make beef and barley soup with onions and carrots. Always had corn bread to go with. Made it recently, its so good
Looks great. It’s interesting to see these once-common staples being revived. Just a couple weeks ago I made acorn flour and baked a loaf of bread with it. I was pleasantly surprised by the rich flavor. 👍
I have several 50 yo oak trees that make bushels of acorns. When I researched it, though, I found that the food quality of acorns varies considerably by tree species. Some acorns are close to sweet, while others need to be soaked in multiple changes of water to leach the tannin out. Mine are basically inedible, but they are also comparatively tiny, as well.
@@brucetidwell7715 Oaks in the White oak family are sweeter than red oaks. I used red oak acorns because that’s what I have in my yard. It took about 3-4 days of leaching before all of the tannins were gone. The flour I ended up with tasted a little sweet, somewhat reminiscent of vanilla or hazelnut. It’s worth noting that some acorns take 2 years to develop. Sometimes the few small ones that drop to the ground are ones that the tree aborted early, maybe because they were defective. Last year I had no acorns. This year was a mast year and I’ve pitched over a dozen 5 gallon pails of them into the woods.
@@ericwanderweg8525 I have Water Oaks. The acorns are very bitter and no larger than hazel nuts, although there are certainly a lot of them. I have probably swept close to five gallons off of my deck, which is just a small fraction of the harvest. Being so small, though, they would be very hard to find on the ground among the leaves and underbrush.
This channel has come so far in production quality it's stunning, and the passion is always at 100%
It's like refried cornbread. Adds texture and taste.
The Scots have a fried barley cake in their repertoire.
Hm, never thought about refried cornbread.
@@farmerboy916 Left over cornbread split and fried in butter for breakfast is wonderful! Add maple syrup and it's almost as good as french toast... almost. I mean, nothing is as good as french toast.
@farmerboy916 put it in chili or beans. Real chili though
Barley is definitely an easy to grow survival food. I grow and sell seed as part of my nursery business. This was the fifth rainiest year since record keeping began in Anchorage and I still managed to get a barley harvest. My heirloom wheat was half dead come fall. Barley is also healthier for you. Although I've read it is used as a dieting food which maybe historically wasn't such a good thing.
Anchorage Alaska? What is your nursery business name?
Ever try einkorn wheat? Worth a try! I like oats rye and barley best tho.
@@AldoSchmedack I didn't like it. Didn't grow well in my conditions.
Barley? You should try the Spartan warrior's main dish then. I think it was whole barley (or wheat) cooked with lentils. I tried it a while ago and it was surprisingly flavorful! They complement each other well.
Hey!!!! 2 million subscribers!!! Been busy lately so haven't been watching as much but been here since before half a million!! So excited for you all!! 💕
looking dashing in that yellow jacket jon!! can’t wait to learn from this video :)
Simple old recipes are a way of travelling in time, soo ..lots o thanks for sharing !! 😘
You could also look up the Forrest Finns with their use of Rye ,and the growing of rye in hot ash after burning down a little forrest areas ,just enough for harvest, or potaoes grown there also.
Some of the local food chefs like Arne Brimi over here has used much barley and also helped it get into ready made foods like porridges,puddings, stews etc.
I'm surprised we don't have more recipes for the poor using the leftovers from the beer brewing process. The "spent" barley from the brewing process are actually super nutritious. Most of the starch/sugar has been extracted, the leftover barley is 70% fiber and 20% protein, it's actually better for you than eating regular wheat, oats, or barley. It can be used wet to bolster your regular doughs, or you can dry it and mill it into flour like any other grain. As for the yeast, the "krausen" or foam on top during the fermentation process isn't all that hoppy, it can be harvested and reused. The "trub", or sediment that falls to the bottom can be washed and reused, though it can lead to mutations that cause off flavours after a couple of brewing and washing cycles, I'm not sure how it would impact the flavours when used to bake breads.
Either butter and honey or gravy... They look delicious. Thanks for sharing. This is so fun.
I've noticed a number of these videos, like this one, are very timely. It's sad that these are needed these days.
I have a book from communist Poland that's all about improvisation! You couldn't get many imported products, so you had to make do. One I've used a few times is soaking dessicated coconut in milk overnight to make "coconut milk"... My Thai curry is about as authentic as a Shanghai Rolex, but I like it!
Growing up, we would cook pearl barley in the crackpot overnight and eat it like oatmeal in the morning. I loved it. I also love John's coat in this video.
That… sounds a lot better of a porridge than oatmeal tbh.
@farmerboy916 oatmeal is really high in protein and very much like grits people kill their potential by trying to always sweeten them. They have a decent amount of starches/ sugars as well. I like grits with butter and black pepper or bacon(iorjust bacon grease), sharp cheddar cheese and cayenne pepper. I always still put a little salt and pepper. Shrimp and grits are popular in the south and many here appreciate the savory and spicy over sweet with gains.
@Texas flood grits with black pepper and/or bacon is delicious. Also, bacon and a little jalapeño is the bee's knees!
@@AlatheD absolutly. I like to throw some Frank's red hot in there too.
I really like this kind of videos, food preservation and alternatives has unique charm that I can't describe.
Any brewing yeast is going to be “yeasty” the hop flavors get added in by actual hops after the brewing process as a preservative. Using any style brewing yeast is fine. Some are more active than others and may have different notes of flavor but will not impart a hop flavor
Fantastic episode JT. Love these episodes that focus on "lower class" foods from history. And those look great - what a wonderful color on those barley cakes. Well done.
You can clean up yeast used to brew beer. You put a bit of water in the bottom of your fermenter and swirl to dissolve the cake. Then pour that water into a bottle and let it settle overnight. Pour that water off in the morning, add fresh, shake, let settle, and repeat. Do this two or three times and the beer flavor will fade. I do this to save previously used yeast for a new batch of beer, it does need refrigeration. On a side note, this is traditional, but will be less effective than bread yeast by around a third. Wine and cider yeasts can be used as well. In my opinion, a chemical leavener would be just as good for this recipe, as the yeast really doesn't have the time it needs to get going.
Good afternoon from Syracuse NY brother and everyone else thank you for sharing live history videos
Cheers from Ulster Co 👍
Hi my friend
Your channel has been such a treat throughout the years brother. Thank you for your dedication to your passion. It really comes across on the screen.
Barley promotes immune system. In elementary school, we were reading about pioneers in upper plains where we lived. We baked homemade bread and used an old fashioned hand-cranked coffee grinder to grind the wheat into flour, and we churned the butter with an 19th century churn.
goos thing you are making these more.. inprovished videos. itll come in handy soon
I know there's still at least one modern example of a cheap bread where the wheat is cut with barley out there: Aldi's "L'oven Fresh Classic White Bread". It's 99 cents for a 1.25 pound loaf and uses a mixture of wheat flour and malted barley flour. Not the greatest bread, but not bad.
Interesting video. When I first saw how they turned out it reminded me of the fried cornbread fritters my mom and grandma used to make. Those were savory not sweet, but if you really wanted to, you could dip it into molasses or honey while they were hot. We normally had them as a bread for the table on nights when biscuits were not made.
I don't watch the news, but today I've had two videos in my feed about food shortages and how to not starve. We live in a strange world.
i love adding barley to soups. its such a nice texture
Thanks, Jon. I was going to say hushpuppies! I think you had it right both times, you just need to meet in the middle. Make it just thin enough to roll out and cut into pancake size cakes to fry in fat. I think I would let it rest al little more as well. It was common that the dough was made before bed and ready to be tended in the morning. Any kind of grain needs time to hydrate.
Jon, how often would dried herbs or things like dried onions be added? I know that these things were grown but I very rarely hear about their use in cooking. I’m from the desert southwest and dried foods are very old news out here. Native cultures dried their favorite foods. Spaniards brought their favorites along with their travels. Certainly Spanish monks and priests did. Dried, powdered things travel well and store well.
I'm sure that would vary drastically based on location and availability/cost.
This channel is just overall incredibly epic. I’m always constantly learning something new.
I noticed in the book, just below the recipe you are making, is Barley dumplings with bacon! You really need to try that recipe.
Yes please!
Love the addition of nutmeg and sugar sprinkled on top!
Recipe as written:. I assumed an old fashioned pancake, a cake cooked in a covered skillet, up to an inch thick, then cut into pieces and fried. I'm glad you mentioned your several failed attempts at the end, and wonder if my interpretation was something you tried that didn't work.
I have a home grain mill, and make a lot of specialty flours from whole grains. Definitely need to try this recipe!
I think if you take your idea and imagine the size that would be what it meant since it said "as large."
These videos never fail to get me through the week, God bless.
Watching your blogs and being from England it makes me realise how close we are still connected through our food history.
Keep the blogs going and thankyou
Very good.. I really enjoyed watching this Jon.. would y'all consider putting the recipe in the description..
Maybe I've missed a few videos due to shoddy youtube recommendations but this song is great! I love the classic townsends music of course but a new tune in my ear is always lovely :) Besides that, thanks for another great video Jon and crew!
So interesting to see your interpretation of the recipe and the struggle to make it work. Your end product does look more like a shortbread than what you described of your earlier attempt but the recipe you read sounded a lot like a Scottish oatcake, a very flat savoury biscuitesque (in the British sense) carb, especially the pancake shape and then cutting (usually into 4) as that is the same shape as an oatcake. Your earlier attempt sounds much closer to that. The good thing is oatcakes are still readily available here in the UK so you could get some references and see if that's closer?
Great work as always!
Also oat pancakes are still available in the UK - a real treat!
Looks like what we call “fried cakes” in Argentina, and here in Patagonia “Fried dough” or “fried bread”. It’s said that they’re of German and British origin.
Thanks Jon! I've been looking for a barley cake recipe. I like your ingredients but I will experiment with different cooking methods.
He who controls the spice controls the universe.
Does this book have the simple and ancient recipe of ground barley porridge? It's tasty and highly nutritious, and the texture is tender.
Put 200 g of barley (ground in big chunks) in a casserole and pour around 500 mL of water, mix and leave at room temperature overnight. Add salt and some sugar, but don't make the porridge too sweet. Boil until smooth, adding more water or milk in the process. Leave for an hour in a warm place or keep the casserole warm by wrapping it in cloth towels. Add a small chunk of butter to your bowl of ground barley porridge and some berry or apple jam of your choice.
Enjoy!
It's a great breakfast meal.
Thank Goodness some barley info! I have a lot of barley products and have been looking for different and new ways to use it.
Let them eat cake!
Thanks ! Never seen barley flour used before, so, appreciated, I have to try that; every bread I have ever had from Whole Foods that included barley flour always tastes better and I add it to soup and stew, vegs.
Never seen the yellow jacket on your channel before, looks nice Jon!
I have a lot of barely right now. And I appreciate learning about the English history of those “shortcakes.” Great episode.
Yellow! A very bright, autumn alternative!
I have done some baking with barley in bread and it makes a really heavy type of bread. It has a very interesting taste to them.
These videos are so fun! Thanks for sharing this information.
It's ironic that 300 years later bread made with "poor people" grains like barley and rye are incredibly expensive and in high demand while processed white bread is considered poor people food.
I believe I've heard of taking barley cakes to the field or traveling, those look great for eating in a break from working or while walking. Have a few swigs of beer or sour wine with them and that sounds like a good meal. I don't think the farmers would have sugar but they probably did have some honey that you could drizzle a bit on them.
A sack of barley meal, some lard and a skillet, you could totally make these at camp in the evening too
I think you're on the right track, but a little off; I reckon they meant 'pancakes' in terms of a potato cake/potato scone, so you should have made the dough rounds about 1/2in thick and a handswidth across, then cut them into quarters such that they're shaped like a (slice of) cake as seen from above, THEN fry them up.
I think that rest period helps to make sure the barley is fully hydrated, just like you rest bread dough.
I like seeing the practical options for modern problems that come from the past
Seeing the intro I imagined barley cakes baked on a greased baking stone by the fire. Shades of King Alfred! So watch they don't burn!
I'd be curious to see this with a first rise of a few hours, roll it out and cut into doughnuts, then second rise them for maybe another hour before frying. I'd also want to try a brewers yeast, to see if the residual malt flavors add some sweetness. OR just go all out and use malted barley to make your barley meal and it would be a totally different end result.
This is how you handle a food shortage, not with bugs.
Always great stuff Mr Townsend! 🙏
Many bread bakers made their own yeast starter or Levain.
Breweries were not always available to a lot of people.
I believe a common practice outside of cities was to shove a piece of dough back in the sack of flour, and let it dry; once mixed into the new dough and rehydrated it would propegate the yeast. An alternative to sourdough so long as you have your ‘proper’ yeast starter, really.
This reminds me of the fried dough one can get and festivals and fairs. It's a plain dough, and any flavor comes from a topping, and they'll usually offer a choice of powdered sugar, cinnamon sugar, fruit-pie like fruit toppings, or savory toppings like garlic and oil. A simple fried dough, not like a doughnut which is definitely sweet.
Very enjoyable video! Well done!
Your channel is consistently informative and relaxing. Thank you very much for doing what you do!
Thanks. I've been interested in using barley flour but where I live you can't find it anywhere (central Otago south Island New Zealand) so I'm going to try blending pearl barley and see how we go. Thanks for the tip😆
I think you would need sourdough for barley, just like you need for rye. I saw a German bakery doing barley breads.
Barley malt is what gives bagels & pretzels their identifying flavor.
they have flavor?
I love that flavor
Barley is a galactagogue. It will help breast feeding mom's. Barley is also good for people who are sick.
"Oats and beans and barley grow... Oats and beans and barley grow... You and I and everyone know..." you know the rest! Old Cub Camp favourite even in Ontario!
I eat pearl barley pretty often actually, it goes qute well with jam. ^_^
Nice to know.
It sounds like "in a pancake fashion" means they were meant to be cooked more like Johnny cakes or hoe cakes (which basically are flat hushpuppies), rather than like modern pancakes? Seems like that's roughly what you ended up with. That's definitely the kind of thing that takes some experimenting to figure out exactly what they meant.
I eat these . I use store yeast and a bit of home ground wheat flour . He means use a biscuit cutter . And they are better as a side fir stew . So much so in fact i make pot pie with it 😁
Barley is great eaten like oat meal with a hand full of fruit or nuts and seasoned with maple syrup
I love watching your channel. It's always so interesting.
This channels videos are sooo cozy
Forget donuts (d'oh): I would interpret the barley cakes as a version of oatcakes from the Derbyshire area of England. These are traditionally used when wheat is scarce. It is a yeasted batter which is cooked on a griddle.....yum.
Of course when Jon mentioned that they were sprinkled with Suger & Spice, you just KNOW that was Nutmeg he was grating on them! 🎃
Nah! It was cinnamon! For the first time in ten years, John was using cinnamon. 😂🤣😂
@@brucetidwell7715 😆ROTFLMAO!!!🤣
From the humble amount of research I’ve been doing, these barley cakes are quite healthy (Minus the sugar that was sprinkled on top of them) when compared to modern grain based food items. Barley is reported to have anti inflammatory and anti cancer properties. That being said, these barley cakes would be somewhat calorically dense but for the farmer/laborer, it wouldn’t be a bother as they’d burn off what they ate and then some before the day was over. Lastly, barley cakes were commonplace in Scottish diets up until the beginnings of the Industrial Revolution, specifically the introduction of the steel mill. Great video and thank you for the recipe Townsends!
This was interesting, as always. Thank you
Barley stews are amazing. Keep up the good work guys!
Now this is a recipe I would like to try! Might make something similar.
I regularly make barley even though I mostly eat low carb due to diabetes. Barley is very nutritious and was used to give the gladiators strength and stamina.
I love the “sugar and “”nutmeg”” I MEAN SPICE” change. Love this channel
Barley is pretty darn good. Scottish folks eat Barley a lot and have for who knows how long ! Barley can be used in almost any meal. Some people even eat Baked Barley
In Sweden we use it in bread, and food. Guess what? It's wonderful!
Thank you 😊
I also prefer wild yeast and keep a crock of it on my tabel
The way you describe the texture reminds me of cooking with buckwheat. Tasty, good crumb, but very filling. :)
We have this in Argentina and in Patagonia we call them “fried cakes”. We usually use plain flour. It’s a very easy and old-fashion recipe! Of German and British origins.
I've been substituting like crazy lately. Today I made carrot cake bread and instead of two eggs, I used one egg and one flax "egg" because they're like gold now. i substituted half the fat for homemade applesauce as well.
I really like the music you have with your videos. A lot of it sounds like music for dancing. Could you do a video about dancing in the 18th and 19th centuries, especially in rural areas and on the frontier?
Good information from the past 🌞
I would have presumed the recipe to mean fried barley flatbread. It is a pretty common way of using barley in northern Europe.
I think the dough, or portions of it, is to be flattened/rolled until the size of a pancake, then cut into small squares, which are then fried.
The food history and recipes are the episodes I watch the most.
Pearl barley, cooked in a good chicken bone broth is great. Even better take the cold leftover barley and toss in and reheat with sautéed mushrooms and greens. Better than risotto!😊