Co vy na to?:)
So based on certain stomach issues a friend experienced that detracted from consumption of seeds (apple of course,) I got to thinking about about elimination or destruction of cyanogenic glycosides. In the process of this research, I realized that traditional cultures have been accomplishing this fairly successfully with cassava for a long time. The basic process with cassava is to ferment the root (with wild yeasts, lactic acid bacteria, bacillus etc.) This releases enzymes and acids which cooperate to hydrolyze the cyanogenic glycosides to the respective sugars and hydrogen cyanide (or hydrocyanic acid in soln.) Then, the root is boiled or dried to allow the HCN to escape. The latter option caught my attention due to the lower temperatures involved being much less likely do degrade actives. HCN, while completely soluble in water, is very volatile. I pulled this from all over the web, but this article covers it pretty well:
http://www.academicjournals.org/AJB/PDF ... t%20al.pdf. Various articles detailed the benefits of grating the cassava prior to fermentation (duh) and innoculation with prefered strains of Lactobacillus plantarum etc. for better flavor/smell profiles. What does this mean to us? Maybe just grind seeds, ferment with lacto culture produced from grain or kefir till sour, dry out material to liberate freed up HCN. Bingo, cyanide free seed powder accomplished with all natural (and low-tech/simple) processes the way traditional cultures have been doin' for a long time!
NOTE: It's likely that this should be done in a very low light situation at moderate temps to prevent unwanted degradation of other components.
What do you think? I'll relate this to my apple seed eating people and see if they are up for a bioassay of thus processed materials.
several weeks later:~1 mL bottle carbonated commercial kombucha mixed with seed powder (3 seeds) to form bubbly paste. Covered. Room temp overnight. Dessicated over the next night. Capped up and consumed. Side effects associated with HCN eliminated while nutritional value preserved with negligible losses .
notes: Kombucha was used as this product is very acidic, anaerobic, and readily available. Many cyanogenic plant materials could be made edible with this simple process. Boiling is not necessary as HCN is very volatile and dried materials will not contain it in its free state. Silica gel was used to avoid potential oxidation associated with other drying methods. In short, it works perfectly. You never know when you're gonna have to live on apples seeds alone .