We pulled in all the quinoa before the worst of the rain started, and it’s been drying on a tarp indoors since then. This weekend, we decided to try to begin figuring out the harvest process.
First, we started with a pile of leaves, seeds, twigs, and various detritus.
We took several handfuls of the collection, and set it on top of a window screen, attached to a plastic storage bin.
Then, we brushed the quinoa across the screen, which forced the seeds (and some of the smaller bits of detritus) to fall through into the bin. We plucked out the larger bits of twigs and leaves, until nothing was left on the screen.
The result? This is definitely step one, only: lots of dust and inedible bits remain in the quinoa that landed in the bin.
Still, you can see we’re getting closer! The next step is probably winnowing… now if only the sun would come back!