Freemotion to the fermented oats phone please.

[big brown horse]

Got another skinny horse being rehabbed by Sam's new trainer. She has tried everything and the horse still looks terrible. I told her about lacto fermenting oats in whey and she is ready to try it.

One question, why do we rinse the oats after they ferment? And to be sure, it is an overnight soak isn't it (that is what I've been doing)? I've just read that two days is good too, or until they bubble.

In a nutshell I told her about the probiotics, how much easier they are to digest and how fermenting makes all the nutrients much more bioavailable. Is there more I can tell her?

Thanks so much!! Johnny has made such a fast improvement I can't believe the results so far. (I'll post photos soon for everyone to see.)

 

[Wifezilla]

In most cases you rinse after fermenting for people food. I imagine it will be the same for the horse oats. You want to wash away the anti-nutrients released during the soaking.

 

[abifae]

Like scrubbing the ick off your skin after you soak in hot water when you are sick?

 

[freemotion]

To rinse or not to rinse, that is the question....

There are two ways of looking at it, in my view....we soak flour to make pasta, bread, etc, and the flour isn't rinsed. It is just soaked for 12-24 hours for a bit of lactofermentation. That is the route I went with my horse when I first started feeding my animals this way....her health and weight completely turned around rather quickly, as you have experienced with your two guys.

If you want to ferment a bit longer, I like to rinse. You won't be rinsing all the probiotics away....they proliferate so quickly that you can't rinse them away unless you go overboard, I suppose, or use heavily chlorinated water. I use town water, with some chlorine, but it is not heavy, you can't smell or taste the chlorine.

Rinsing prevents bad stuff like slime and mold from growing. You don't know what conditions your grains were harvested in, usually, and sometimes there can be some mold spores already in the grain. You need to discourage this. So I rinse once a day in cooler weather, twice a day when it gets hotter. Your nose will tell you. The perfect timing smells like a slightly sweet yogurt. The animals all seem to really love it at this stage, too.