A paleoinvention useful now!
You've heard about rubbing two sticks together to make a self sustaining heat emitting plasma. Primitives used this plasma to denature proteins rendering them more digestible. Essentially the big idea of cooking was that you could digest things outside your own stomach, then eat them once they were palatable and assimilable.
I read a recent Nature magazine that noted Protein as well as vitamin A were global nutrition priorities Much has been written about golden rice that brings needed vitamin A to common food
Wheatgrass Juice has lots of vitamin A as well as other nutrients It can be rapidly made thusly:
split a piece of wood to create a friction surface then rub a wad of fresh green grass on it Then drink the juice that collects
This idea which is a bunch like rubbing two sticks together would bring nutritional benefit to millions of people
People just are not aware that they can eat grass juice The reason this is an actual invention is that grinding grass on wood to make nutritious food is apparently new
Now obviously grinding wheatgrass with a blender is well established, but the new woodcraft item of breaking a piece of wood to make a much needed food is the thing
4 ounces a day covers all of childs needs but just an ounce would ward off huge amounts of blindness dermatitis n fragility
I mean an ounce of grass juice made from rubbing fresh grass on a piece of wood is actually a useful technology
actually I will make this n see if it actually works-- beanangel, Feb 16 2009 wikipedia wheatgrass juice http://en.wikipedia...ki/Wheatgrass_juice4 oz of grass juice provides a days supply of vitamin A to a child [beanangel, Feb 16 2009] I suspect though I cannot confirm this that humans have been doing just this sort of thing since the dawn of mankind. Using wood and stone for grinding and pulping of grasses and grain has been going on for millennia, Sorry but your Idea was kind of widely known to exist before existence was widely known to exist.
Even before the use of wood and stone primitive man(and many animals today) chew on grass and leaves to extract essential oils and nutrients.
From a purely technical perspective, rubbing a wad of grass on a fleshly split piece of wood is just about the least new and least effective and least efficient way to do the job I can think of and the inventions of primiative man would seem to confirm this. Man has been grinding flour since the dawn of history which is essentially predigesting food. Spices, oils, and other such materials have been extracted from plant material since before recorded history. As such your assertions are totally out to lunch. Man has known about pre-digestion of food since there has been man around to eat food(cooking, grinding, drying, cutting etc are all examples of pre-digestion or breaking foods down to aid in digestion)
Your idea is a million or two years behind the curve sorry to say.-- jhomrighaus, Feb 16 2009 but why don't they do this now
there is no record of it
I've heard of people milling maize with rocks, tapping syrup, even prechewing their childrens food
but I havent heard about primitive people rubbing tufts of new grass on broken wood
It kind of reminds me of the Limes discovery; prior to the use of a tropical fruit the English could have just ground herbage on wood to make juice with a lot of vitamin C They just didn't know-- beanangel, Feb 16 2009 // but I havent heard about primitive people rubbing tufts of new grass on broken wood //
Uhmm I would guess that it is because it is a very poor way to do the job and noone, primitve or otherwise would chose to do it that way. A basic stone mill would do the job far more effectively, efficiently and safely(no splinters) and would be infinitely more durable.
Perhaps you should investigate the primitive production of sugar which is effectively the same process you are describing.
again I would posit that simply chewing on wheat grass is a more efficient and effective approach from a primitive perspective.
As far as claiming an invention based on something that could not have been known in prehistory is not an idea.
PS how much grass would you need to rub on the splintery, dirty piece of wood(that you first need to split open) to generate that ounce of juice that you are talking about?-- jhomrighaus, Feb 16 2009 "Pretend everything was invented before fire"="The Flintstones"I think this has probably been done, but that doesn't stop it from being an invention. The mere fact they didn't know what carotenoids were isn't really an issue because there are other ways of thinking of it. More seriously, wheatgrass isn't a particularly good source. Chickweed and dandelion are quite a lot better, for a start, and the former is much easier to juice. Marigold's better too. Carrots aren't without selective breeding, though i still think they might be better. I also wonder about certain poisonous plants like deadly nightshade - i would be surprised if it wasn't high in provitamin A, and the problem would then be to get rid of the atropine, probably with something like oak galls or silverweed. Still, dandelions are our friends.-- nineteenthly, Feb 16 2009 [jhomrighaus] Uhmm I would guess that it is because it is a very poor way to do the job and noone, primitve or otherwise would chose to do it that way
I think they would; think of those photos of malnourished people they might lack the capital to get a grinding wheel yet could immediately repurpose a piece of firewood to cure part of their malnutrition if they knew
[jhomrighaus] how much grass would you need to rub on the splintery, dirty piece of wood(that you first need to split open) to generate that ounce of juice that you are talking about
The wikipedia article says that "the vitamin and mineral content of 1 ounce of wheatgrass juice is roughly equivalent to the vitamin and mineral content of 1 ounce of fresh vegetables" Thus two or three ounces of grass might yield an ounce of juice
I appreciate the sugar cane idea I was going to suggest that a new variety of grass sized sugar cane be produced so that this idea would taste delicious thus spread rapidly I've hankered for GMO sugar cane that is narrow diameter plus soft like grass as a new human food
[jhomrighaus] I would posit that simply chewing on wheat grass is a more efficient and effective approach from a primitive perspective
I've tried grass Its kind of durable n tastes like grass, the juice is much more palatable-- beanangel, Feb 16 2009 //something that should have been invented before fire// water-- xenzag, Feb 16 2009 Basic stone mill == two rocks-- Noexit, Feb 16 2009 // Basic stone mill == two rocks//
Yeah that was kind of my point, firewood has a much more valuable purpose of generating heat. Rocks are plentiful, durable, and essentially free.
I suspect also that one would require a significantly larger amount of grass than a few ounces to generate any meaningful volume of oil do to the inherent inefficiency of the process.-- jhomrighaus, Feb 16 2009 First, I'd like to point out that it took me until "I read a recent Nature magazine" before I knew it was Beany, so well done for language improvements.
I am pretty sure that, if people in need of vitamin A actually knew they could get it from grass juice, they would find more effective ways of doing this. So, I don't think you can claim the stick as an invention; but plants as a source of vitamin A is obviously not widely known to exist amongst the relevant populations.-- MaxwellBuchanan, Feb 16 2009 What's to stop them from using their teeth for grinding?-- Spacecoyote, Feb 16 2009 Only thing I can think of is you could get a nicer taste out of some woods... pine maybe.
[marked-for-deletion] prehistoric cooking recipe-- FlyingToaster, Feb 16 2009 Pine is poisonous.-- Spacecoyote, Feb 17 2009 No, not all of it. Pine nuts? Also, you can make tea from the needles and it's high in carotenoids and vitamin C. By the time they get up here, Citrus fruits are pretty crappy and though i can think of much better and more easily available sources of those nutrients, maybe further north there might be no alternative. Some of it is addictive, so that's a reason for avoiding it. I've only used it when i can't get anything else, and then medicinally.-- nineteenthly, Feb 17 2009 I do not think that amongst what in this discussion were termed 'primitive people' Vitamin A deficiency is that much of an issue - the deficiency surfaces in populations we would call 'advanced', because there the food is much less diverse ...-- loonquawl, Feb 17 2009 There are a lot of people in poorer countries who are blind in connection with vitamin A deficiency, and measles is a more serious problem there for the same reason. Whether the same would've been the case in palæolithic times i don't know. I suspect it might be connected to other factors.-- nineteenthly, Feb 17 2009 random, halfbakery