WEBVTT

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Welcome to Spotlight Advanced. I'm Bruce
Gulland and I'm Megan Nolette. Spotlight uses

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a special English method of broadcasting.
It is easier for people to understand no

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matter where in the world they live. A man is in his kitchen.

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His name is Samous Blackly. In
front of him is a large flat wooden

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board. Blackly covers the board in
a special powder. It is a kind

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of flower made from a grain called
iron corn. This is one of the

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oldest forms of wheat. Then he
takes a large ball of dough from a

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bowl. He begins to push and
pull the dough, kneading it into a

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round shape. The sweet smell of
bread fills the room. Then, after

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some time he places the dough in
an earthen to Jean, and he puts

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it into a hot place to bake. The dough begins to bake. Soon

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it will be a large loaf of
bread. But this is no ordinary bread.

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Blackly is making the bread with ancient
grains and ancient methods. But Blackly

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is also using a special yeast.
The yeast will make the bread rise or

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expand. But this yeast is not
the kind people normally use. This yeast

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is also ancient. Using a special
process. Blackly took the yeast from Egyptian

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baking bowls. It is the same
yeast used four thousand, five hundred years

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ago. Yeast is one of the
most important ingredients ever discovered. People use

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it to make bread, alcoholic drinks, and fermented foods. People have been

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using yeast for almost ten thousand years. Today's spotlight is on the history of

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yeast. Yeast is not an ordinary
ingredient like salt or pepper, or sugar

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or flour. Yeast is a very
small living organism. It is a kind

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of fungus related to mushrooms. You
cannot see it unless you look at it

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through a microscope. Yeast feeds on
sugars. When yeast eats these sugars,

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it produces alcohol and carbon dioxide.
This process is called fermentation. Carbon dioxide

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is what causes bread to rise,
and the alcohol gives bread its special flavor.

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There are hundreds of different kinds of
yeast are useful for making food,

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but others do not work as well. One popular kind of yeast makes a

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bread called sour dough. Sour dough
has a special tart flavor. Other yeasts

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make alcoholic beverages. Koji is a
yeast used in Japan. The Japanese use

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it to make a drink called sake. But there are even yeasts that people

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do not use much. These are
called wild yeasts. Humans first started using

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yeast in food before people invented writing. Experts think the first use of yeast

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was probably an accident. Wild yeast
probably fell into a sweet drink and the

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drink started to ferment. When people
tasted it, they found it was good,

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so they took some of the drink
and used it to make more.

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They were taking yeast and growing more, though they did not know it.

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These were the first brewers. From
this point, yeast began to change.

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People began breeding the yeast. If
they made something that they liked, they

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would repeat the process, and they
started breeding different yeasts for different things.

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The yeast began to specialize. Kevin
Vastrappen is a scientist at the University of

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Leuven. He studies yeast genetics.
He spoke to Science Daily about this process.

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Sometimes early brewers had a very good
fermentation. They were smart enough to

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harvest the yeast. They used it
to start the next batch, even if

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they did not know what was in
it. Reusing the yeast to make beer

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separated it from nature. The yeasts
were changing in the brewery, remember Shamus

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Blackly from the beginning of this program. When Blackly started making his bread,

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he was excited because of these changes. The Egyptian yeast was a lot like

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sour dough bread. But what was
yeast like almost five thousand years ago?

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Blackly did not know what it would
taste like. When he finally tasted his

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bread, Blackly wrote on Twitter about
his experience. The bread is light and

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full of air, especially for a
loaf made from these ingredients. The smell

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and flavor are incredible. It is
very different. You can easily tell the

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difference even if you're not excited about
bread. The first evidence of people using

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yeast comes from China. The ancient
Chinese made a drink called qui. They

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used water, honey, rice,
and fruit. Drinks made with yeast had

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a lot of advantages. Of course, people liked the effects of alcohol,

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but drinks made with yeast were also
safer than water. In ancient times,

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drinking water could be dangerous. It
could make a person sick very easily,

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but alcohol kills many of the diseases
that live in water so you could drink

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it without getting sick. Many civilizations
used this to their advantage. In ancient

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Greece, people mixed water with strong
wine. This killed the bacteria in the

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water, and because it was mixed, they could drink it most of the

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day without being drunk. But making
foods with yeast makes them more delicious and

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healthier. These are fermented foods.
The yeast breaks down sugars that may be

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difficult to digest. Kafir is a
fermented drink made from milk. It is

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from eastern Europe. For most people, milk is very difficult to digest after

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childhood. This is because of a
sugar called lactose, which most people cannot

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digest, but the yeast in kafir
breaks lactose down. Because of this,

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kaffir has almost no lactose in it. The yeast makes milk safe for people

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who cannot drink milk. Many ancient
people also used yeast to help in food

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storage. Fermenting foods in this way
is called pickling. Fermenting or pickling makes

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food last longer, but it also
changes the flavor. Kim is one of

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the most famous pickled foods from Korea. Kimchi is fermented vegetables using cabbage and

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radish. In ancient times, people
made kimchi so that these vegetables would last

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through the winter, But soon people
began to make kimchi because they liked the

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taste. Today we do not need
yeast to clean water or to preserve food,

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but over the years humans have developed
a taste for fermented foods. We

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eat them now because we like them. We continue to make them because they

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are part of our traditions and they
can connect us to people who lived thousands

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of years ago. When he made
his bread, Blackly wrote on Twitter,

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this is very exciting. I am
so amazed that it worked. It is

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such a mudgical thing. We can
share food in a rather genuine way with

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our distant ancestors. Do you use
yeast in your diet? What fermented foods

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do you eat? Do you make
any yourself? Tell us about it on

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our website at www dot Spotlight English
dot com. You can also find us

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on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram,
and Twitter. The writer of this program

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was Dan Chrisman. The producer was
Mitio Ozaki. The voices you heard were

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from the United Kingdom and the United
States. All quotes were adapted for this

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program and voiced by Spotlight. This
program is called Amazing Ancient Yeast. Visit

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our website to download our free official
app for Android and Apple devices. We

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hope you can join us again for
the next Spotlight program. Goodbye,