The khorasan flour we stock is from Wholegrain Milling, based in Gunnedah, NSW. But what is it?
Khorasan is an ‘ancient’ grain that is both nutritious and easily digestible. It is believed to have originated from Mesopotamia (now mostly modern day Iraq, but with parts of Iran, Syria and Turkey) before finding its way to ancient Egypt. You may also have heard the term Kamut used for this flour, and the difference comes down to a trademark; Kamut is an “heirloom” variety of khorasan that must meet certain criteria (dictated by Kamut International) for it to claim the moniker.
The story goes that a US airman by the name of Earl Dedman, stationed in Portugal post WWII, met a man in a bar who offered him just 36 seeds of a grain he said he’d taken from an Egyptian tomb. Dedman, a keen horticulturalist, sent them home to his father Rube in Montana, who cultivated them into a small crop of “King Tut’s Wheat”.
Some time later, a handful of these grains were passed to another Montana farmer, Thomas Mack Quinn. Quinn’s son, Bob, an early pioneer of organic farming methods, recognised a growing interest in the unique health properties of the grain, and decided to protect it by preserving the grain as unmodified and organically grown under the trademark of Kamut®, and in Australia, this is sold exclusively by Kialla Pure Foods.
While khorasan most definitely contains gluten, many people with a sensitivity to gluten report being able to eat khorasan wheat without any difficulty.
