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Torsten

Poppy seeds

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I don't like opiates.

However, I bought a few kilos of poppy seed cos I thought we might start selling them on SAB (for baking purposes only). So when I was packing them into containers today I had a nibble on some seeds and found them disgustingly bitter. So disgusting I simply had to have some more... and some more... and more. Total probably about 15g in about an hour. I noticed that after every chew I would get a wave of ....something. It's pleasant and somewhat sedating and inebriating, but it's not classic opiate. At the moment having to struggle to keep my mind on writing this post

As I don't like opiates, but I do kinda like this feeling, I wonder if this is due to substances other than opiates. I read that the seeds contain a protein that has strongly sedating qualities (the thing they test for to determine if someone tested for opiates due to poppy or due to drugs).

It's not something I would do often, but I might just start doing more baking

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hehe

this is an ayurvedic recipe i got off the net & use it in the summertime, mostly when it's really hot & i just need that extra something to help me drift off to sleep (and am avoiding alcohol, cos it promotes usually mildly unpleasant lucid dreams):

"This delicious chutney is a powerful way to balance both the mind and the emotions. For best results, eat one hour before bed.

Ingredients

1 tsp. white poppy seeds

1 tsp. coconut powder (fresh grated if possible)

1 pinch of cumin

1 pinch of turmeric

small amount of Ghee (clarified butter)

Method

In a small bowl mix the poppy seeds with the coconut powder, adding small amounts of water as you mix until it forms a thick paste and set aside.

Melt the ghee in a frying pan until it turns clear.

Add turmeric and cumin and mix well.

Remove immediately, and simmer without heat until the color and aroma of the spices change slightly.

Add to the poppy seed mixture, mix well, and let stand five minutes.

Add a little salt to taste. "

in winter i make a hot milk drink out of almonds & cashews & poppy seeds (more than the above), which is heavier & warmer

(hmmm 15g is probably about..what..? 8 teaspoons or something? just thinking out loud)

[ 26. September 2004, 23:56: Message edited by: coin ]

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Thanks coin!

This was very shortlived. 30 mins after the last dose my mind was 100% clear and another 10 minutes later my body had caught up with full attention too. This was not at all like poppy tea and really didn't feel like opiates. It wasn't overwhelming, but still quite nice. I was chewing the seeds very slowly, savouring the nice nutty taste that comes after the disgusting bitter beginning. It comes on so fast each time that I would think it was absorbed through the mucous membranes in the mouth. Maybe soaking in water is not such a good idea for these effects (eg like tea), but rather methods like chewing or like coins recipe to prolong buccal contact.

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Is this the Tassie blue stuff? glaxo stock?

They always say theres no morphine in them, but people have clearly been getting off for years on them

When i went to Kakulas sister in Fremantle to get some said they were suddenly selling 50kg a week~! It seems theyd been discovered

I boiled some up to see what teh fuss was about but couldnt get past the milk gak taste.

Im normally gae for anything but i must have already been off colour that day

Its possile its any one of the othe alkalioids in Poppy seed, not necessarily the morphine group

As demonstrated by Argemone its not unknown for alkaloids to be in the seed in the papaveraceae

heres few others youd find in Opium that might be located too

... ok forget it! the list is far far too long!

just remind me to show you the book of u dont have it already

Its the one by L.D. Kapoor

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I've wondered about this too,cause I don't like opiates particularly but get 'something' from chewing supermarket tassies.As you said T,it's short lived but somehow rewarding much like an opiate.I thought it was in the fine powder coating the seed,but now I'm convinced the bitterness comes from within the seed itself.

:cool:

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I've got the book

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i soaked a 500g bag in one of those big tins of pinapple juice for about 2 hours once,strained all the seed out and shared the cocktail with a friend. we couldnt walk or talk within an hour of drinking it,and i ended up asleep (comatose)

on the back patio until the following day.

even then(12-18 hours after consuming it) i was getting waves of nausea everytime i stood up.

urrgh...wouldnt do it again.

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hi all...firstly just like to say i really enjoy these forums some of the best reading around ..i wish i had more time to read it all ...any how ..

my family heritage is czech and as a child my mum would make us poppy seed cake ...delicous and makes you sleep like a baby ...you can get a few recipes from google ...basic recipe is :

grind about 250 grams of seed..

simmer in small pot with about 1/2 cup whole milk , 2 big tblspoons honey , and crushed nuts and dried fruit or raisens etc ..

simmer the whole lot for about 5 min ( dont let it boil ) .

the mixture should be like a thick paste not runny ..

spoon mixture onto shortbread pastry base ( you can buy these pre-made at a supermarket ..

put into oven at 180 c bake till base is cooked ..

and sweet dreams ...

one thing i did notice as a kid ..most europeans are like a good family argument ..but after a coffee and a few slices of poppy seed cake everyone mellowed out and chilled .

makes me wonder if simmering in the milk is a way of extracting alkaloids from the seed? or was it the acid in the honey ? the nuts ?

any takers?

cheers tomtom.

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The bitterness is definitely on the outside of the seed or in the very outer layers at least. I keep some seed in my mouth and just kinda suck it until the bitterness is gone. Then I start chewing and there is no further bitterness.

The seed is blue "Product of Australia" by Trumps baking ingredients.

I used to love poppyseed cake in grmany. It is very popular there. Although I can't recall ever getting any effect from it. But given the rather strong effect from this seed I assume I just wasn't paying attention of the heat kills the goodies.

I might try a quick rinse with some acidic juice and then consume this, in comparison to eating the rinsed seed at another time. That hsouls establish if the goodies are on the outside (eg residual alkaloids), or on the inside (eg a protein).

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have you ever heard of any reports about seeds used for their effects in the places where they grow poppies from centuries ?

i don't ! but that just maybe means that when a tribe is growing poppy, they immediatly focus on the strong drug and forget to report the weaker effects of seeds.

there was a lot of discussion about poppy seed tea at poppy.org. a lots are from newbies and the typical answer is "try the pod instead" etc... but i remember a few which were serious, with a scientits approach and interesting links.

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there was a news story once of a lady who was addicted to poppy seed ..she would consume at least 2 large packs of seed a day she would contiunaly chew mouthfuls of seed ...hard to believe just from having tried a spoon if dried seed myself..argh!

Im sure in the czech cake its got something to do with the simmering in milk ..maybe the enzymes ? or the honey for the same enzymes or maybe the chemical reaction of all 3 .

the czech culture also has a tradition of mushroom soups ..another foodstuff that was encouraged by my mum to help us sleep ...

there are a lot of similarity with german and other slavic peoples in using food as nutrition and ethnogenicly.

as far as noticing the effects with poopy cake .i would have at least 2 slices which are huge wedges about 2 cms thick ..theres a lot of poppy in that ..im sure you will feel something even subtlely ..its an end of the day type food i think .

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for the poppy conisseur (?spelling?) poppy seeds are the bottom, really, like beer with alcohol.

Extract from poppy heads are much more enjoyable, like a good wine for tha alcy...

let's not speak of the strong spirits (heroin etc)

re poppy seed extract:

Bought this kilos from the indian shop, at 5 bucks a kilo but they hardly worked.

Extr from 1 kilo had only mild effects...

6-8 poppy heads are way better...

say my knome

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gomaos your absolutely right..pods im sure are the best for effect ...conisseur ?? hardly..just love the poppy seed cake thats all...mmmmmyumdrool

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gomaos:

for the poppy conisseur (?spelling?) poppy seeds are the bottom, really, like beer with alcohol.

im sure you mean 'goon' there dont ya Gom

If it were like beer and wine then itd be reinforcing the idea that what we haveis a very different effect that isnt really comparable

still you cant knock goon too much..

a belly full of piss

and a pillow to sleep on

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gomaos you missed my original point. I was NOT looking for an opiate high. As previously stated the most attractive thing about poppies to me is the beauty of the flower, but not the alkaloids. Which is why I was suprised that I got an effect from the seed that was pleasant. Please read this in contrast to my dislike of opiates.

Sure, for someone seeking the opium hit the seed is a desperate choice. But that's not what I was looking for and is also not what I got.

After 3 nights of chewing the seed I have come to the conclusion that this definitely has something to do with buccal absorption. A couple of batches of seed I washed down did nothing at all, while those sucked slowly (5mins) gave the pleasant effect.

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im sure you mean 'goon' there dont ya Gom

why? are you a goon if you like poppy tea?

why? it doesn't automatically turn you into a junkie, if that's what you mean.

i would say that drinking poppy extract is less addictive than drinking beer for example.

And aesthetically if that's the right spelling again,

the poppy high to me is way above the stupefying, disassosiative hit that the alc gives you, if you mean that.

So, not goon, but connisseur.

If consuming poppy extract makes one a goon, then anyone consuming alc (beer, wine whatever) must surely be a hobo!

Alcies are hobos really. Just look into any pub, at all these hobos... look at their mindless, idiotic stare

"having a bottle in front of me,

feels like a total frontal lobotomy"

And Torsten, yes, I understand...

but again, someone seeking an opiate high is not automatically below what you do.

Yeez, bloody junkies, they've spoilt it for everyone.

Stupid heroin!

[ 30. September 2004, 10:53: Message edited by: gomaos ]

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Goon is the Australian vernacular for cask wine.

Goon bag = silver wine bladder inside cardboard cask, also known as a pillow.

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as a migrant i will try to show off this new word, right away tomorrow at the bottelo.

coloqial lingo allways has been one of my interest,lately prolly out of necacity, because as a migrant with strong dialect you get more aceppted in the pub using the term taylor made instead of cigarette...

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ok, u want my austrian tony kaiser germ dumplings poppy seed story instead?

hmm, clears his throat....

i remeber many poppy seed culinary delightst,

1, flaky pastry poppy seed "strudel",

once a week after, the family went to town (weekends, mostly museum visits = i am viennise {vie got incredible museums!!} / inspector rex {sbs show} country) we would religiosly stopp at the aida bakery and buy poppy seed strudel, that made the whole family shut up and contenplate ther day...

not too long ago i got cought trying to smuggle poppy seed into oz from aus,

naturaly they showed up at the scan and i got searched "big times" and threatend with prosecution...

but i told them: " as far as i know clean poppy seeds, suitable for human consumption,

represents a legal import into oz...

well after that jet legged as i was, i said ok take the poppy seeds, i don't want any trouble).

than this quarantine officer appears with an austrian accent like me saying, oh for poppy seed strudel, i like'd it aswell,...

but obviously there is now "real poppy strudel in oz", and i guess it because oz politics have changed ther course from british / european (poppy ok) too indo / pacifican (poppy a big no, no).

2, toni kaiser's "germknoedel"...

in austria 20 years ago we all at summertime go to the public bath's and eat germknoedel with "lots of poppy seed sugar sprinkles on top.

3, tichy ice cream poppy seed,

not active but special and legal!!

[ 30. September 2004, 16:17: Message edited by: planthelper ]

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There is a rather interesting subculture of people using poppy seed tea (with lemon juice) on a regular basis.

A pretty weird site: opiophile.org Unfortunately you have to register to view a rather measly collection of posts. Still, some interesting stuff there.

Gomaos: I think Ott says that people who like opiates are at best 20% of the population or something like that. That includes me, and probably a few others, and trying to explain it to the rest of them is rather like explaining to my wife why I post things on bulletin boards in Australia early in the morning.

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it would be quite common to put freshly ground nutmeg in that chutney, or similar preparation..poppy seed & nutmeg are frequently used together, including treatment of insomnia...theyre considered to have similar uses.

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The Herbalist i met In Bali gave me here recipe of 5 nutmegs boiled with sugar as a treatment for insomnia

Presumably the toxins arent water soluble enough that 5 nutmegs is a problem

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that was what i forgot and thanks coin ...nutmeg and now that i think of it cinnimon was also in that czech poppy seed cake recipe ...

mixture wise it starts to get chemically interesting..

coin's ayurvedic recipe also use a dairy component as does the czech recipe the only difference is the honey ..

veerryy inter resting ?????

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yeah poppy seed tea is the bottom of the barrel for sure. i agree with you gom i would prefer poppy pod tea to alcohol and herion and has given opiates a bad name.

if it were legal i would have poppy tea on the weekend after working all week but since it isnt i often have a bit of kava :)

i had been known to drink seed tea sometimes but i am glad to say i can't be bothered these days it really knocks you out and not in a pleasant way

once at a protest in WA there was this dick of a guy who was making batches of the stuff all the time, but he was so stupid he didn;t care what he did with the seeds. he scattered them throughout the camp site which in my opinion is careless. it was a pristine old growth forest and he was distributing a weed into it and as it turned out he was hiding from the cops and didn't really give a shit about the trees at all, he stole my mates car and made it to darwin before the cops got him....anyway had my my little rant

will have to try the seed eating one day.

also if you have plenty of seed make the strudel it is delicious i often make it when i can be bothered.

[ 01. October 2004, 16:20: Message edited by: hebrew ]

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