Did the raisins eaten 4,000 years ago have seeds in them?

I was reading about cakes of raisins in the Bible, and I was wondering if the people back then simply chewed their seeded raisins extra well or if they, too, had seedles raisins.

And on that note, has anyone tried eating raisins that had seeds in them?


I'm interested in dehydrating homegrown purple grapes and the thought of having to de-seed each grape is daunting, which made me curious as to how the ancients made their raisins.

- Smile

from enotes.com

Quote

Seedless grapes cannot be grown in the conventional way, from seeds. Therefore, to produce a new plant, growers take cuttings from other seedless grape plants and root them.

Although the exact origin of seedless grapes is unknown, it's possible that they were first cultivated thousands of years ago in the regions presently defined as Iran and Afghanistan. The seedless grape originated by way of a genetic mutation (called stenospermoscarpy) in which the hard seed casing failed to develop.

One the most popular varieties of seedless grape today is the green Thompson seedless grape. Ninety percent of all raisins are made from this variety of grape.

you can make your own rasins by drying seeded-varieties. You'd just have to be as careful as eating any seeded fruit I assume, eating them kinda like cherries and have some mouth acrobatics (very careful not to bite down) or like..grapes..very careful to pick your teeth afterwards

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Could the seeds possibly change in texture after dehydrating to become dry and easily chewed?

Probably not, but that would be nice.

I eat seeded grapes, with the seeds in. They can be chewed up without much trouble, so I don't see why it should be a problme with dried ones... unless they somehow become much harder when dried, but I suspect they would turn more "crunchy" than "hard". The only way to be really sure is to (carefully) try it!

how would that work exactly? there are usually at least 4 seeds in a grape and a raisin is about the size of 8 seeds. those would be some Large and mostly crunchy raisins! i suppose you could cut them in half, scoop out the seeds and then dry them. seems like an awful lot of work.

They used currants instead if they wanted seedless raisins:
[www.tytyga.com]
"Basically, all ancient raisins were grown as two types: the regular sized grapes were dried, large in size with large seed, and the raisins that came from Corinth, Greece were called currants (the word is a corruption of the word Corinth). The currants were very small but grew into huge grape clusters on the grapevine, and were extremely sweet with an aromatic, intense flavor. Currants became an international, valuable success, and were sought after, even being grown to be used in trading matters like currency. The word, currency, derived from the word currants."

[www.raisins.org]
"Muscat raisins - oversized, with seeds, and a fruity, full flavor were the primary crop in Malaga and Valencia. Currants - tiny, seedless, tangy raisins - were planted in Corinth, Greece, where historians believe they got their name."

Tells how they de-seeded raisins a few decades ago, to see it scroll down to the pic of the meatgrinding-type machine.
[www.madehow.com]
"How lucky we are that many of our foodstuffs are already dried, seeded, and otherwise prepared for inclusion in our favorite recipes. We purchase seedless raisins and don't even have the option of purchasing raisins with seeds. However, this was not the case over TOO years ago. Then, seedless raisins (expensive) were sold alongside those with seeds (noted as cheaper and "more commonly used".

One might have saved pennies buying raisins with seeds but invested time in seeding those tiny fruits. How? One cookbook suggests that Valencia raisins be heated slightly with water in order to plump them, and then cut with a knife and de-seeded by hand! However, enterprising manufacturers produced labor-saving devices for women's kitchen chores, including deseeding raisins. First, the housewife clamped her Boss brand raisin seeder to her kitchen table. Then, she loaded the raisins into the hopper at the top. As the housewife cranked the handle, the raisins were squeezed between two grooved rubber and toothed-metal rollers, which exposed the seeds. The seeds were then forced out a chute at the front (pushed out by the metal-toothed rollers) and the raisins dropped below the rollers into a pile."