If I were raw tahini, were would I be?

[ciarac]

So, I happily stumbled across what would appear to be raw tahini (sesame paste) in a health food shop near here. I live in Barcelona, Spain, so some things get lost in translation here, but I did email the producers and they said that the only time the seeds were heated was in the drying process and she was quite sure that temperatures never reached 48 degrees celsius, so, it WOULD be a raw tahini. It certainly looks raw.

My only concern is that it lives on the shelves with the other tahini and nut butters (as does an apparently raw almond butter which is damn expensive but worth trying at some stage). Wouldn't raw tahini go in the fridge? I mean, how can it possibly be durable on the shelf? Or does all that fat preserve it? I ask cos about 2 weeks ago I made raw tahini which I really didn't like so I put it in the fridge and covered it and pretended it wasn't there, cos I didn't want to deal with it. Well, just now, I dealt with it and it had some nice little colonies of critters in the form of a fungus forest growing on top. Naturally it is now in the bin.

So, that's the story of my raw tahini.
Should I beware of the raw tahini in the shop?? If it were raw would it have to be in the fridge section...oh my! So many questions!

[Bananna]

well...i dont know, I'm pretty new, but my raw almond butter that was on the shelf said refridgerate after opening...nothing's growing as of yet...but then, I'm eating it regularily.

[Carlsbad]

I think something about the way they seal things keeps them from going bad without refrigeration. I have raw tahini that I bought on the shelf and now keep in the fridge. It's fine. Lot of SAD food is like that too--think of all the jams and jellies and whatnot that are sold on the shelf but that you have to refrigerate once you've opened them. Once whatever it is has been opened, it is more vulnerable to mold and stuff.

[ciarac]

Ok, that makes sense. I've noticed that when shop bought tahini settles, an oil film develops over it. Perhaps that seals it off from bacteria and fungus. Anyway, I'm gonna CHOOSE to believe that it's raw.

[mousebandit]

Just a comment- the SAD canned and jarred foods that you buy have been heated to very high temps to kill all the enzymes that could cause spoilage! (I learned this in my food preservation class last summer.)

This is a very interesting thread, because now that I think about it, I don't see how they could jar these things up without at least enough heat to make the seal. Now, I know that the old timers used to can jams and jellies without the 212 degree water bath (which modern canners FREAK OUT about, LOL), but they still had enough heat in the cooked fruit itself (which had been boiled) to set the seal (which required melting the wax or softening the sealing compound), then as it cooled off, the seal would "set". So, maybe our store-bought raw isn't as raw as we'd like to think,

Things that make you go, "hmmm"!!!

Tracey Mouse

[ciarac]

Indeed Tracy, I agree, that's why I asked.
But, I DID check out shazzie's website and other raw stores and they say their raw tahini can be kept on the shelf but must be refrigerated upon opening. My guess is what I mentioned; that oil that settles may seal off the bacteria...OR, they have a way of sucking air out before sealing the jars because of course fungus needs air to breed...but then, bacteria doesn't cos it's anaerobic, right? But the fungus is what we definitely don't want since the bacteria would just ferment the stuff. But then I don't want fermented tahini either...

[Bananna]

well I Just opened my jar of tahini in the cupboard and the lid wasn't sealed. Instead it had a sticky label on the top of the jar which was very hard to get off. But the lid itself didn't pop at all. I thought that was curious...but didn't worry about it since I knew it wasn't tampered with due to this paper seal...now it makes sense.