Post by blackcrowheart on Mar 31, 2006 12:41:19 GMT -5
Black Oak Acorns - cleaned
About 20 pounds
Water
Cedar or redwood bows
Acorns are gathered in the fall, right now we are in the peak of the
season. Usually the first fall of acorns we disregard. They are
normally the wormy ones. Sometimes we will gather these "Pehepes",
and use them in our dance regalia. These "Pehepes" are acorns that
have been infested with worm larve, and they make the acorns form
looking like hunchbacks. They make interesting necklaces and there is
a story about "Pehepes" and why we use them, but that again is
another chat...
My family and I have been known to gather tons of acorn. In the past
my Great Aunt Mary had a room in her house where we would deposit all
of the acorn we gathered. This was a 10'x12' room, with a four foot
board across the doorway. This room was always full of acorn. As
children we used to fight for the right to jump into the acorn and
stir them up. Anyone bigger than a child would crack the hulls. This
had to be done twice a week so that moisture didn't build up and that
the acorn dried properly. Traditionally our people stored acorn in
'Chukas', acorn graineries made of cedar and California laurel. These
are cylinder in shape and raised above the ground on stakes about
three feet. Lacking a spare room for my acorn, I store mine in gunny
sacks and hang the filled bags from the rafters in my garage. My
sisters living on the rez, use the huge army surplus bins my parents
bought. They keep them covered and stir them twice a week. No matter
how you store your acorn it is essential that you add a generous
amount of California laurel with the nuts. Laurel or bay leaf is a
natural insect repellent and keeps the bugs away from the acorn.
We let the acorn dry or season at least for a year, this assures that
the nuts are well dried. We then crack and hull the acorns. We then
spread the acorn meats to allow any additional drying. On the acorn
is a red skin, the skin is thicker in the crevices of the nut, it is
very important that all of this skin is removed. Otherwise when
cooked it is like trying to swallow the chewy part of popped corn.
When the nuts are dried this red skin has a tendency to really cling
to the nuts. If you sprinkle a little water on them when they are dry
it lifts the skin making it easier to remove. We use an open twined
winnowing tray in this process of removing the husk skin.
Once the acorn is cleaned thoroughly and dry, we begin the hard work.
The acorn now needs to be pounded. It is not ground. We do not have
grinding rocks, we have pounding rocks. We also have granite mortars
and pestles. The pestles are raised above the hole in the mortar rock
and allowed to slide through your hands into the acorn in the mortar.
Some folks use a 'hopper basket' which catches the acorns as they hop
up and allows them to roll back into the mortar. The basket is a
conical shape, like a funnel. Of course this is a very time consuming
process and you develop wonderful arm muscles. But, let's face it
folks, this is 1998. Today for smaller batches you can use an
electric coffee grinder, a Veggiemeal, mill and juicer works wonders
for medium batches. For large batches like my sister and I do, we use
an electric flour mill. The acorn flour should have the consistency
of wheat flour mixed with very fine corn meal.
Once you have your flour ground, you can begin your next step. This
process is called leaching. In this step you are washing out the
tannic acid in the flour. Tannic acid is bitter to taste, if you can
digest enough it is toxic. Only cattle, pigs, deer and rodents are
known to eat them raw. Though in California there are documented
cases where in a heavy acorn fall cattle ate too much acorn and
dropped dead in the pasture.
Traditionally we would go to the nearest stream and find a sandy
area. Here we would form out a leaching bed and spread out the acorn
flour on top of the clean sand. We would then form a channel bringing
the water to the bed and allowing a steady stream to flow over the
acorn. Cedar bows are used to allow the incoming water to flow evenly
over the flour. You would allow this to continue for at least 8-10
hours, depending on how much and how deep the flour is, after 8 hours
you would make a taste test to determine if it was ready. Today we
have a raised table made of boards and chicken wire, which we cover
with a thick bed of fresh pine needles, and then a clean cotton
sheet. On top of this we spread the acorn flour and leach it using a
water hose placed on top of a spread of fresh cedar bows. It still
takes 8-10 hours. When the leaching process is complete, the flour
will no longer have a bitter taste, but rather a slightly sweet
taste. When it is ready we pick it up off the leaching bed. It comes
up like globs of wet clay. Using the traditional method of a sand bed
you would gently wash off any sand with water. Because acorn is high
in oils not much adheres to it.
The leached acorn flour is then mixed with water, usually a 2-1 ratio
for a thick soup or a 3-1 ratio for a thinner soup. This is an
approximate measure, as my sister and I mix the flour and water with
our hands and know what we are looking for. My sister and I still
cook acorn in the traditional method, using baskets and hot rocks.
The baskets used for cooking are three rod coiled cooking baskets.
They are water tight. In order to use these baskets for cooking they
must be soaked in water overnight. This allows the basket material to
soak in the water and makes the basket water tight. Before cooking
acorn we take a little of the leached flour and rub it into the weave
of the basket to assure no leakage. We then mix the leached acorn
flour with water in the basket.
The morning we are going to cook the leached acorn we build a large
fire in the cooking fire pit. The fire is built upon a stack of
cooking rocks. They can be either basalt rocks or soapstone any other
type of rock will burst and crumble. Whatever you choose to use, you
always count them before building your fire. Your fire is a clean
fire, built of clean wood. No use of petroleum products to start your
fire, and never, never throw trash of any sort into a cooking fire.
We use only oak or manzanita wood, as these are hot burning woods and
leave little ash. We keep this fire burning hot for at least a couple
of hours.
When we are ready to cook, the cook's helper will lift the cooking
rocks out of the fire one at a time, using large sticks called
'pinita', they resemble oversized chop sticks, made of young cedar or
oak saplings. Each rock is dipped into a vessel of water to wash off
the ash, then a second vessel to assure it's cleanliness. The rock is
then placed on the cooks waiting cooking paddle or stirring loop. The
cook then gently lowers the rock into the mixed acorn flour, one at a
time. It takes approximately four to six rocks the size of an adult
fist to bring a basket full of acorn soup to a full rolling boil. The
cook keeps the rocks in constant motion. This assures that the basket
is not scorched or burned. This cooking process takes about 15-20
minutes. The baskets used are about as large if not larger than a
large stock pot. This is a very efficient method of cooking. When the
acorn soup, or 'nupa' is done, the cook removes the hot rocks from
the soup. Sometimes the cook will drop the rocks onto clean cedar
bows and allow the acorn adhered to it to bake, making what my kids
call acorn chips. Other times the cook dips her hand into clean water
and cleans off each rock as she takes it out of the soup then drops
it onto the earth to allow it to cool and bake clean itself. This is
how we cook acorn soup, or 'nupa'. The other way we serve it is in
little water dumplings or 'ulay'. For this we cook the acorn into a
very thick soup, when it is done cooking we use a small basket and
individually dip a basketful of the thick acorn soup into very cold
running water. It immediately solidifies into like a gelatin
dumpling. Many elders prefer this older style of cooked acorn. This
is how my people, the Northern Sierra Mewuk (Miwok) prepare acorn.
Acorn is high in protein and contains almost every essential vitamin.
This we know because we had to have it analyzed before the doctors at
Oak Knoll Naval hospital my grandmother was in prior to her passing
would allow her to have it.
Note: A little background on myself: Here in California I am referred
to as a Traditionalist, that is I still practice the traditional ways
and ceremonies of my people. I am a basketweaver, I make coiled and
twined Mewuk (Miwok) baskets. I am a founding Board Member of the
California Indian Basketweavers Association, and served on the Board
for the last eight years. I am an artist, I work with oils, acrylics,
pastels, watercolors, pencil and pen. I make jewelry, a view of my
work can be seen in the May 1997 issue of Ornament Magazine in an
article announcing the opening of a Beadwork show at the American
Indian Contemporary Arts Gallery in San Francisco. For those of you
who are wondering what I look like, if you have a copy of the
Time/Life Series, Indians of America, in the Indians of California
book, you can see me, on page 54, there is a photo of me cooking
acorn.
Recipe by Kimberly R. Stevenot (aka Billierose)
Northern Sierra Mewuk (Miwok) Tuolumne Rancheria, Tuolumne, CA
www.zianet.com/witchy/recipes/native
About 20 pounds
Water
Cedar or redwood bows
Acorns are gathered in the fall, right now we are in the peak of the
season. Usually the first fall of acorns we disregard. They are
normally the wormy ones. Sometimes we will gather these "Pehepes",
and use them in our dance regalia. These "Pehepes" are acorns that
have been infested with worm larve, and they make the acorns form
looking like hunchbacks. They make interesting necklaces and there is
a story about "Pehepes" and why we use them, but that again is
another chat...
My family and I have been known to gather tons of acorn. In the past
my Great Aunt Mary had a room in her house where we would deposit all
of the acorn we gathered. This was a 10'x12' room, with a four foot
board across the doorway. This room was always full of acorn. As
children we used to fight for the right to jump into the acorn and
stir them up. Anyone bigger than a child would crack the hulls. This
had to be done twice a week so that moisture didn't build up and that
the acorn dried properly. Traditionally our people stored acorn in
'Chukas', acorn graineries made of cedar and California laurel. These
are cylinder in shape and raised above the ground on stakes about
three feet. Lacking a spare room for my acorn, I store mine in gunny
sacks and hang the filled bags from the rafters in my garage. My
sisters living on the rez, use the huge army surplus bins my parents
bought. They keep them covered and stir them twice a week. No matter
how you store your acorn it is essential that you add a generous
amount of California laurel with the nuts. Laurel or bay leaf is a
natural insect repellent and keeps the bugs away from the acorn.
We let the acorn dry or season at least for a year, this assures that
the nuts are well dried. We then crack and hull the acorns. We then
spread the acorn meats to allow any additional drying. On the acorn
is a red skin, the skin is thicker in the crevices of the nut, it is
very important that all of this skin is removed. Otherwise when
cooked it is like trying to swallow the chewy part of popped corn.
When the nuts are dried this red skin has a tendency to really cling
to the nuts. If you sprinkle a little water on them when they are dry
it lifts the skin making it easier to remove. We use an open twined
winnowing tray in this process of removing the husk skin.
Once the acorn is cleaned thoroughly and dry, we begin the hard work.
The acorn now needs to be pounded. It is not ground. We do not have
grinding rocks, we have pounding rocks. We also have granite mortars
and pestles. The pestles are raised above the hole in the mortar rock
and allowed to slide through your hands into the acorn in the mortar.
Some folks use a 'hopper basket' which catches the acorns as they hop
up and allows them to roll back into the mortar. The basket is a
conical shape, like a funnel. Of course this is a very time consuming
process and you develop wonderful arm muscles. But, let's face it
folks, this is 1998. Today for smaller batches you can use an
electric coffee grinder, a Veggiemeal, mill and juicer works wonders
for medium batches. For large batches like my sister and I do, we use
an electric flour mill. The acorn flour should have the consistency
of wheat flour mixed with very fine corn meal.
Once you have your flour ground, you can begin your next step. This
process is called leaching. In this step you are washing out the
tannic acid in the flour. Tannic acid is bitter to taste, if you can
digest enough it is toxic. Only cattle, pigs, deer and rodents are
known to eat them raw. Though in California there are documented
cases where in a heavy acorn fall cattle ate too much acorn and
dropped dead in the pasture.
Traditionally we would go to the nearest stream and find a sandy
area. Here we would form out a leaching bed and spread out the acorn
flour on top of the clean sand. We would then form a channel bringing
the water to the bed and allowing a steady stream to flow over the
acorn. Cedar bows are used to allow the incoming water to flow evenly
over the flour. You would allow this to continue for at least 8-10
hours, depending on how much and how deep the flour is, after 8 hours
you would make a taste test to determine if it was ready. Today we
have a raised table made of boards and chicken wire, which we cover
with a thick bed of fresh pine needles, and then a clean cotton
sheet. On top of this we spread the acorn flour and leach it using a
water hose placed on top of a spread of fresh cedar bows. It still
takes 8-10 hours. When the leaching process is complete, the flour
will no longer have a bitter taste, but rather a slightly sweet
taste. When it is ready we pick it up off the leaching bed. It comes
up like globs of wet clay. Using the traditional method of a sand bed
you would gently wash off any sand with water. Because acorn is high
in oils not much adheres to it.
The leached acorn flour is then mixed with water, usually a 2-1 ratio
for a thick soup or a 3-1 ratio for a thinner soup. This is an
approximate measure, as my sister and I mix the flour and water with
our hands and know what we are looking for. My sister and I still
cook acorn in the traditional method, using baskets and hot rocks.
The baskets used for cooking are three rod coiled cooking baskets.
They are water tight. In order to use these baskets for cooking they
must be soaked in water overnight. This allows the basket material to
soak in the water and makes the basket water tight. Before cooking
acorn we take a little of the leached flour and rub it into the weave
of the basket to assure no leakage. We then mix the leached acorn
flour with water in the basket.
The morning we are going to cook the leached acorn we build a large
fire in the cooking fire pit. The fire is built upon a stack of
cooking rocks. They can be either basalt rocks or soapstone any other
type of rock will burst and crumble. Whatever you choose to use, you
always count them before building your fire. Your fire is a clean
fire, built of clean wood. No use of petroleum products to start your
fire, and never, never throw trash of any sort into a cooking fire.
We use only oak or manzanita wood, as these are hot burning woods and
leave little ash. We keep this fire burning hot for at least a couple
of hours.
When we are ready to cook, the cook's helper will lift the cooking
rocks out of the fire one at a time, using large sticks called
'pinita', they resemble oversized chop sticks, made of young cedar or
oak saplings. Each rock is dipped into a vessel of water to wash off
the ash, then a second vessel to assure it's cleanliness. The rock is
then placed on the cooks waiting cooking paddle or stirring loop. The
cook then gently lowers the rock into the mixed acorn flour, one at a
time. It takes approximately four to six rocks the size of an adult
fist to bring a basket full of acorn soup to a full rolling boil. The
cook keeps the rocks in constant motion. This assures that the basket
is not scorched or burned. This cooking process takes about 15-20
minutes. The baskets used are about as large if not larger than a
large stock pot. This is a very efficient method of cooking. When the
acorn soup, or 'nupa' is done, the cook removes the hot rocks from
the soup. Sometimes the cook will drop the rocks onto clean cedar
bows and allow the acorn adhered to it to bake, making what my kids
call acorn chips. Other times the cook dips her hand into clean water
and cleans off each rock as she takes it out of the soup then drops
it onto the earth to allow it to cool and bake clean itself. This is
how we cook acorn soup, or 'nupa'. The other way we serve it is in
little water dumplings or 'ulay'. For this we cook the acorn into a
very thick soup, when it is done cooking we use a small basket and
individually dip a basketful of the thick acorn soup into very cold
running water. It immediately solidifies into like a gelatin
dumpling. Many elders prefer this older style of cooked acorn. This
is how my people, the Northern Sierra Mewuk (Miwok) prepare acorn.
Acorn is high in protein and contains almost every essential vitamin.
This we know because we had to have it analyzed before the doctors at
Oak Knoll Naval hospital my grandmother was in prior to her passing
would allow her to have it.
Note: A little background on myself: Here in California I am referred
to as a Traditionalist, that is I still practice the traditional ways
and ceremonies of my people. I am a basketweaver, I make coiled and
twined Mewuk (Miwok) baskets. I am a founding Board Member of the
California Indian Basketweavers Association, and served on the Board
for the last eight years. I am an artist, I work with oils, acrylics,
pastels, watercolors, pencil and pen. I make jewelry, a view of my
work can be seen in the May 1997 issue of Ornament Magazine in an
article announcing the opening of a Beadwork show at the American
Indian Contemporary Arts Gallery in San Francisco. For those of you
who are wondering what I look like, if you have a copy of the
Time/Life Series, Indians of America, in the Indians of California
book, you can see me, on page 54, there is a photo of me cooking
acorn.
Recipe by Kimberly R. Stevenot (aka Billierose)
Northern Sierra Mewuk (Miwok) Tuolumne Rancheria, Tuolumne, CA
www.zianet.com/witchy/recipes/native