I've been reading up about medieval times of late (research for a new book called Jiva) and I discovered that 75% of the population were directly involved in food production, the same proportion of people in modern day Cuba since they've had their Special Period (enforced peak oil due to the breakdown in relationship between Russia and due to US sanctions).
I suspect, no I predict, it will be a proportion that will be adopted across the world as oil availability decreases. I also suspect that food as a commodity will once again be valued and our farmers revered. They're the mob that keep us from starvation.
Interesting... but not what I set out to say. In medieval times a common drink was almond milk.
3 comments:
Almond milk is my vegan milk of choice in my tea and is also horrifyingly expensive to penniless student hippies so I make my own. I also took steps to make almond milk a sustainable eventuality by planting a small almond tree. This almond tree spent a season clinically dead and had no leaves for a year. I stuck it out the back and forgot about it and promptly moved leaving my daughters with its desicating husk. It stayed that way till I decided that I could reuse the pot and phoned them up to dump the dead tree out of the pot so I could pick it up.
Imagine my geniune surprise when my daughters said "it's not dead"! It has 15 almonds growing on it and is the very first of the almond trees that I am going to plant here on Serendipity Farm. Along with hazelnuts (perfectly suited to life here in Tassie) and Walnuts we should be somewhat nut sufficient in about 10 years time. Cheers for sharing your own personal nut tree story. I agree with you...food is the commodity of the future and the more we get planted on Serendipity Farm (especially perennial food like shrubs and trees) the better!
Do you have a recipe you could share? Would love to have a go. I've made soy milk (so easy), imagine it is something similar.
I have a Thermomix which makes making any of the rice, nut or oat milks quite easy. If you search Quirky Cooking I know she is dairy free and often makes nut milks and creams as well as other divinely evil usually gluten, sugar and dairy free foods.
My almond tree I had assumed would require a pollinator. It was planted when we moved in here. This year, just as we are about to move out, it bore about 40-50 almonds. No such luck for a harvest though as my kids decided to pick all bar 10 almonds off the poor tree! You can imagine the shade of red that I saw. I am hoping to be able to come back and prevail upon our tenants next year whilst I dig up the tree, along with the apple tree too.
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