GROWING GRAINS By: John Vivian

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Compact herb/nut-grinder-type mills. such as the handy little Back-To-Basics mill with its easily cleaned stainless steel burrs, will grind a pound of grain into flour in a single easy pass, but need eight or ten minutes to get it done.

In a class by itself is the uniquely powerful Vitamin food-processor/juicer/blender/universal mill. Rigged for dry grind, it will make pancake flour from two cups of whole grain in 90 seconds. Rigged for wet, it will mix and pour the batter, then clean itself afterward.

Do your homework and be sure to check the Internet, too-sic your search engine on "grain mills." One warning: many of the gristmill makers are small firms that strive for quality rather than quantity production. With the Y2K scare selling self-sufficiency apparatus like never before, manufacturers of several of the very best models are months behind at this time (summer of '99) and not foolish enough to add capacity to meet a panic-fueled demand that will evaporate in a few months.

So check availability if you need fast delivery. Or wait till the Y2K panic (it has long been our contention that Y2K is more marketing tool than root of global catastrophe) passes and buy a used mill.

Don't grind any more whole grain than you'll use in a week or it may sour, mold or become weevil-infested. To prevent these problems any other way, you'd need a whole arsenal of toxic chemicals.

TIME REQUIREMENT

Using a powerful rotary tiller to prepare the land and a powered string trimmer to cut small grain-and in between doing all the planting and cultivating by hand or with the wheel hoe I put in close to four hours per bushel of corn or wheat: at least one hour each to plant, harvest, thresh and winnow. Assembling the equipment and putting it away more than doubles the time required. I need a half or even a full day to accomplish each task (and I could do several times the land and crop in that time. Moral: grow more rather than less grain once you get into it.)

If all of this seems like a lot of time and effort to turn out a few loaves of bread or bowls of porridge-which modern farm and food technology can produce in minutes and for pennies a pound you are correct. Taut it takes effort to be able to feed (air family no matter what might happen out in the world. And there is no more basic place to begin than growing good bread from scratch.

Amaranth

Amaranth is not a grass, but a four-to six-foot-tall, broad-leafed plant that produces edible (when cooked) greens, plus highly ornamental plumes, which develop legions of tiny round seeds more nutritious than any cereal grass. Good for people who are allergic to wheat or corn.

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