sunflowers are garden gold!

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Remember that the edible nutmeats inside sunflower seeds lose their vitamins when exposed to the air for any length of time ... so it's a good idea to shell the food only as you need it. Roasted seeds eaten as a snack, of course, are cracked open and popped into the mouth individually, just as nuts are. But if you're going to use quantities of the raw kernels for cooking, you'll have to adopt a more productive method.

One good technique is to soak the seeds in cold water for several hours. The husks eventually soften, and can then be removed quite easily. Or, you can spread your "victims" between two layers of newspaper, and crush the hulls with an old-fashioned rolling pin.

Another method is revealed in Euell Gibbons' Stalking The Wild Asparagus. "I discovered that if the seeds were run through a food chopper fitted with a plate barely large enough to prevent the seed going through whole," writes Euell, "the shells would be cracked off." Mr. Gibbons then dumped the crushed hull-andkernel mixture into a large bowl of water, and let it stand for half an hour. The light outer coverings floated to the top of the liquid and were skimmed off ... and the heavy kernels-which stayed at the bottom-were poured into a piece of muslin, squeezed, spread on a baking sheet, and dried in a slow oven!

Incidentally, the process just described was Euell's way of getting ready to make a flour-like sunflower-seed meal ... and you can do that, too! When the crushed kernels are dry, pass them through a sieve, and save the pieces that won't go through for use as nuts in cookies and such. The portion which is small enough to come out the other side can then be put through a food chopperusing the finest plate attachment possible-or a grain mill. Result? You'll have a supertasty high-protein meal that can be used as an "extender" in meat loafs and the like ... and as a substitute for some of the flour in baking recipes.

Speaking of recipes, the ones that follow are just a few of my favorites. Try 'em, and then to a little experimenting on your own. See for yourself why sunflowers really are gold from the garden!

Using a mixer, blend egg, oil, and sugar to a creamy consistency. Add the milk and stir in thoroughly. In a separate bowl, sift together the whole wheat flour, sunflower meal, salt, and baking powder. Add the dry ingredients to the liquid blend, stirring only enough to mix. Then spoon batter into greased muffin tin, and bake twenty to thirty minutes at 400° F.

SUNFLOWER PANCAKES

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