@ Recovering Academic
2025-02-26 23:40:27
Welcome back to the #eggprogramming note series.
Let us talk about yellow peas and red lentils, and why they feature in this egg program.
Please consider all values presented to be in the proverbial ball-park, rather than guaranteed.
Upon macronutrient inspection, yellow peas and red lentils are similar:
Yellow peas are 22% protein and 2% fat.
Red lentils are 24.5% protein and 2% fat.
Japanese quail need 16–24% protein to be well. Studies will often arrive at 20% for an adult quail, and 24% (or higher) for an adolescent, especially when they are younger than three weeks.
There are pros and cons to either end of the spectrum. From the egg perspective, more protein generally results in more, larger eggs. From the cloacal perspective, more large eggs are generally associated with more prolapses.
If one were to shoot for the lower bound, it would be prudent to utilise more animal protein and/or supplement lysine and methionine. You will see these featured in commercial mixes as deficiency can be an issue, especially when plant protein is predominantly deployed.
I want to minimise supplements, and focus on whole foods, as well as minimise how much fish I need to deploy for financial and proccessing reasons. Although, the current fish method does seem to be going a long way. More to come in another note about that. If you had access to cheaper meat meal of some kind, I could see how it might find its way to being a larger constituent.
We have 5% as the upper bounds for fat for the total mix so it is nice that yellow peas and red lentils are 2%, which is quite low.
The omega 3:6 (the ratio between omega 3 and omega 6 fatty acids) for yellow peas is .205, whilst for lentils it is .271. I consider anything above .1 to be pretty groovy/manageable in the plant realm when programming eggs and humans.
For every 100g of red lentils there is .414g of omega 6 and .112g of omega 3. This leaves .302g of omega 6 per 100g of red lentils to be balanced: and we can do this with 1.51g of flax seeds for every 100g of red lentils.
So, 3.775g of flax seeds would draw our omega 3:6 to 1, just taking into account the 250g of red lentils in the mix.
We need more due to the yellow peas which have .696g of omega 6 and .143g of omega 3 per 100g. So, that is .553g to be balanced per 100g which equates to an additional 20.74g of flax seeds to cover the entire 750g of yellow peas in the mix.
I am fond of flax seeds for this ability and will produce a separare note about it.
You might have noticed that there is processing involved with the yellow peas and red lentils. This is because they have unideal antinutrients in them like tannins, phytates, and trypsin inhibitors. Conveniently the red lentils and yellow peas we get are dehulled/decorticated, which removes a lot of the tannins and phytates, but some still remain and so do the trysin inhibitors.
Cooking thoroughly is a solution. Soaking also helps. You can even ferment. If they were whole seeds, it seems that sprouting them first then cooking them would be the most effective way to destroy these compounds. So, if you have whole seeds, that is an option.
I have played the fermentation game, and my nose just says no to me when I smell their food and it smells like nice kombucha. I prefer it to smell buttery, sweet, and fishy.
To process the yellow peas and red lentils I wash them first and deliver the milky rinse to the garden. I feel like I have more leeway before they smell weird doing this. This is especially useful on hot days. The nose knows, you know. It also gets rid of miscellaneous debris, and perhaps peculiar residues. Six hours is ample on the soak, but I usually do it overnight.
After soaking, I rinse it all again and then put them in a large cast iron pot without the lid in the oven for 90 minutes at 170°C/338°F. It seems that 121°C/249.8°F for 90 minutes is ample. So, you could use a pressure cooker. It is also nice to get to this temp or higher to destroy any bacterial spores. Mayhaps I sleep better dancing above this temperature . . .
I like the ease of the oven. In the antinutrient literature I have read they go up to 180°C/356°F, and I feel better about all of the yellow peas' and red lentils' exposure to heat at this temperature for this time in this way, taking into account that I do not stir them to save time.
Once they are cooked I lay them out on sheets of baking paper in the beloved dehydrator (perhaps the singing heart of the homestead). They get 5 hours at 70°C/158°F. Upon dehydration, the yellow peas and red lentils are ready for inclusion in the mix, although they will need to be ground prior to consumption.
You might be wondering why I have used 25% red lentils and 75% yellow peas. Price is a factor. Yellow peas are 62.5% of the price of red lentils. Red lentils are, however, more performant: they are higher in protein, they exhibit a better omega 3:6. They are also more dense in several micronutrients: calcium, iron, potassium, phosphorus, selenium, ascorbic acid, niacin, pyridoxine, folate, and compounds in the vitamin E group, although there is more vitamin K in peas.
The reason I have used red lentils is becauase they are easily accessible. I have noticed some black lentils present with even higher protein, so that is exciting. However, they are not as easily available for me. Moreover, I like that these are red, becasue I like red pigmentation in yolks.
A lot.
More to follow regarding yolk colouration in later notes.
#protein #peas #lentils #egg #programming #nutrition #health #homestead #homesteading #bird #quail #farm #wellbeing #wellness #chickens #longevity
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