What is the typical shelf life of grains and seeds?
I would like to make a large amount of multi-grain porridge mixture in one batch, to store and use small amounts of when I need it. The recipe says that the fattier seeds will go rancid if kept for too long, but doesn't say how long that might be.
The recipe includes:
- oats
- barley
- rye
- linseed (flax seed)
- sunflower seeds
- pumpkin seeds
Of these, the linseed and sunflower will be the most fatty.
How long can I keep these, and seeds in general, for?
Best Answer
Here is a site https://www.usaemergencysupply.com/information-center/self-reliance/storage-life-of-dry-foods#link7 which addresses many of the items listed, but unfortunately does not address the ones of most concern to you, the fattier items of sunflower and pumpkin seeds.
Flax they call a hard grain and put at 10-12 years with wheat and such. Rye, oats, and barley they class as soft grains and 8-10 years in dry 70 degree temps. Lower temps would extend.
I would think that pumpkin and sunflower would be considerably lower, possibly treated more like a nut. For very long term storage, canning, or vacuum sealing may be an option for reaching the 4+ year stage. I have had several year old nut meat which was canned then frozen with only minimum degrading beyond the initial softening caused by heating to can. All long term storage will cause some degrading though. To minimize, you would want cool, dry and no sunlight.
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Quick Answer about "What is the typical shelf life of grains and seeds?"
The shelf life of a grain largely depends on the type you purchase and how you store it. Most grains will remain fresh for 6 months, with some having a shelf life of over a year when kept properly. While different grains have different requirements for storage, most grains are best kept in a cool, dry and dark place.What grains have the longest shelf life?
The best grains for long term storage are:- Buckwheat.
- Corn.
- Flax.
- Millet.
- Kamut.
- Durum Wheat.
- Hard Red Wheat.
- Hard White Wheat.
What is the shelf life of wheat?
Shelf Life A good rule of thumb is to rotate wheat so that no stored product is older than 5 years. However, older stored wheat did make acceptable bread. A B.Y.U. study indicated that, regardless of headspace oxygen level, wheat packaged in No.How do you store grains for years?
Ideally, this should be a cool, dark, dry place with temperatures in the 62\xb0F to 68\xb0F range. Place the Mylar bag in the plastic bucket and fill it with grain. Add one 2000 cc oxygen absorbing pack, or 2 to 3 smaller sized packs, squeeze the excess air out of the bag, and seal with the portable heat sealer.Do grains go rancid?
But the texture of grains starts to deteriorate after about three months, getting harder, just like those beans we talked about earlier. They also are more likely to be infested with little pantry bugs the longer you keep them too.Food Storage: How to Extend the Shelf Life of Nuts and Seeds
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Answer 2
You can keep them until you dislike the taste.
The first changes in the oils start immediately after processing the seeds, so there is no real border of saying "up until that state the seed is not rancid, afterwards it is". It is a gradual change.
How long the change takes depends on things like the storage temperature, the amount of sunlight on the seeds, the amount of antioxidants they produced during growing, the degree of processing, etc. Combine this with the "gradual change" part and we cannot tell you a strict time. It is usually measured in months - not weeks, and not years. But I don't think we can be much more concrete. You have to just throw them out when they have changed to a degree that you dislike them. Alternatively, you can create a month's or 2 month supply and redo it when finished, that way it probably won't go rancid on you.
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