Soaking Oats and Re-using Soak Water?

[johnny71]

Is there any benefit in saving the soak water from oats, and using it over and over to help speed up the process of phytic acid break down? I was reading about this idea of 'accelerated fermentation' where they were saving the soak water from brown rice and reusing it and after three or so soaks the soak water was removing 96% of the phytic acid!

I've been doing this for a week now and so far the soak water doesn't seem to have gone bad. It has some kind of sediment on the bottom but the smell from the water smells oaty.

Just curious if anyone else does this.

[alabama544]

Actually oats have almost no phytase, the enzyme that breaks down phytic acid, so soaking plain oats doesn't help. I read about "complementary soaking" at this website:

www.rebuildfromdepression.com

The idea is that you add about 10% of a high phytase grain (rye, buckwheat, barley), ground, to your presoak. Instead of grinding small amounts fresh every time I need it, I purchased Bob's Red Mill malted barley flour (it is diastatic but not "diastatic malt powder) and add just a pinch to my oats when I soak them. I assume the enzyme activity is robust, because if I add too much the enzymes break down the oats too much and they don't thicken when they cook. Also, even small amounts give it a creamy sweetness. As far as dumping the water, the phytase enzyme breaks down phytic acid, so there is no need to dump the water. FWIW, I also add the malted barley flour to lentils and beans for the same purpose.

Also, FWIW, making your soaking solution acidic helps the phytase enzyme. Calcium inhibits it, so don't soak in any dairy (including whey).

[rocky123]

Hi
Recently, I've been asked multiple times what kind of oats we use, and to explain the details of how I make our breakfast cereal, so here goes..
For the longest time, we have been buying organic rolled oats in 5 lb bags from Azure. When I run out in between orders, I will buy organic rolled oats from Superstore, one of our local grocery stores, but these are a bit more processed (not quite a quick oat, but a bit more along those lines), so I prefer the Azure ones.