Why is this ancient grain making a comeback?
By Chelsie Vandaveer
September 7, 2004
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It is thought that lupins, lupines* or termis beans (Lupinus albus Linnaeus) were cultivated as long as 3000 years ago by the Egyptians. Pliny the Elder wrote a lengthy treatise on lupins calling them "the next most extensively used plant...." Certainly, the seeds were common in the middens (trash heaps) of Myos Hormos, a Roman settlement in Egypt dating to the first and second century. ("Report 2001- The Plant remains:", Quseir al-Qadim Project, Archaeology, University of Southampton)
In the New World, the tarwi or variable lupin (Lupinus mutabilis Sweet) was cultivated throughout the Andes 1500 years ago, domestication long predating the Incas. ("Lupinus mutabilis", Lost Crops of the Incas, National Academy Press, National Academy of Sciences, 2000)
Although high in proteins and fatty acids, lupin seeds contain bitter quinolizidine alkaloids which have to be removed by soaking before the seeds are consumed. Since the fall of the Incan and Roman empires, lupins have remained an underutilized resource.
In 1999, the International Food Policy Research Institute estimated that farmers will have to increase production of 'grains' by 40 to 50 percent on ever-decreasing arable lands to feed the growing world population for just the first twenty years of the new millennium. ("Feeding the world in the next millennium:", IFPRI, Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research, 1999)
Germans were well aware of the potential of the lupin or wolfsbohne at the turn of the last century. The plants could be used as a cover crop to protect and improve soil and as forage for grazing animals. The seed can be added to animal feeds, as components of foods for humans, and even 'pickled' in brine as a snack food. During the 1920s and '30s, Reinhold von Sengbusch (1898-1985) rose to a challenge. Von Sengbusch is the suesslupinenzuchterfolg, the breeder of better lupins, 'sweet' varieties without the bitter alkaloids.
Germany and France lead in the world's production of lupin seeds for the world market. Canada, Australia, and the US are test-producing varieties, both descendents of von Sengbusch's sweet lupins and land-races of the Incan tarwi. The plants can grow on marginal soils, leaving the soil enriched for following crops of melons, corn or wheat.
Back at the turn of the last century, German botanists knew of a myriad of uses for lupins and they proved it with a banquet in 1917. Mrs. Maude Grieve wrote of their dinner:
"...a German Professor, Dr. Thoms, described the multifarious uses to which the Lupin might be put. At a table covered with a tablecloth of Lupin fibre, Lupin soup was served; after the soup came Lupin beefsteak, roasted in Lupin oil and seasoned with Lupin extract, then bread containing 20 per cent. of Lupin, Lupin margarine and cheese of Lupin albumin, and finally Lupin liqueur and Lupin coffee. Lupin soap served for washing the hands, while Lupin-fibre paper and envelopes with Lupin adhesive were available for writing." (A Modern Herbal, 1931, reprinted Dover Publications, 1971)
*Lupine is an American name, lupin is used in most other countries. Using the convention suggested in Lost Crops of the Incas, lupin is reserved for domesticated (crop) species, lupine for wild or horticultural types.
The Plant Genome Data & Information Center of the National Agriculture Library of the USDA has a photograph of Reinhold von Sengbusch who among many other accomplishments created better strawberries. To view his photograph, click on the link:
http://www.nal.usda.gov/pgdic/Strawberry/figures/fig13.30.htm
killerPlants Tendrils: ~~1~~2~~3~~4~~5~~
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