Posted on 01/09/2007 10:44:14 AM PST by blam
'Brainy' chickpeas conquered the world
09 January 2007
NewScientist.com news service
Could the humble chickpea have changed the course of history? As one of the founder crops cultivated in the fertile crescent of Mesopotamia, the chickpea's nutritional benefits have been cited as one of the reasons for the rise of civilisation there.
Now Zohar Kerem from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel, thinks he has evidence to support that view. Kerem and colleagues collected wild chickpeas (Cicer reticulatum) and compared their nutritional value with that of cultivated varieties. Wild chickpeas are rare and difficult to cultivate, so there must have been a good reason why our ancestors persevered with growing them around 11,000 years ago.
(Excerpt) Read more at newscientist.com ...
Don't we have a couple articles about recent (6,000k YA) human brain evolution?
Pasta and Cheech Ping!
What do you call a gardening video about garbanzo beans?
A Chickpea flick.
Hugh hubbub as humdrum humble hummus gains hubris due to hungry humans.
Go Go Garban-zo!
I make my Pasta Fasole with chick peas.
Cicer reticulatum?
No wonder they changed their name to "chickpea."
Reticulatum sounds more like a proctological procedure.
Ooohhh!
I love chickpeas, and expecially hummus.
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"Kerem speculates that prehistoric people knew chickpeas were nutritious. "It probably made them feel good," he says. Not everyone is convinced that chickpeas kick-started human empires. "There is no clear indication of when selection for increased brain effects occurred - was it 10,000 years ago or 5000?" says Bruce Smith of the Smithsonian Institution in Washington DC."
Personally, love em - especially in a salad!
Delicious!
So, the basis of human civilization is hummus??
Pasta Fagioli (better known as, and often pronounced Pasta Fazool) with chick peas is called Pasta and Cheech in my family.
unfortunately I have developed a food alergy to legumes in the past few years and cant eat it.....and I do miss it.
Did you just come up with that?
That reason, says Kerem, is the amino acid tryptophan - a precursor of the neurotransmitter serotonin. Increased amounts in the diet may improve performance when under stress. Tryptophan also promotes ovulation, an advantage during a time of human expansion. Cultivated chickpeas had over 3 times as much tryptophan as their wild cousins (Journal of Archaeological Science, in press).+
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Is that related to peanut allergies?
Isn't Hommus made of chickpeas?
Yeah.
I eat lots of chickpeas, and it's well known they enhance alliterative ability.
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