Friday, November 18, 2011

Progress with Bracken Ferns


A 7' long Bracken Fern


More Bracken Fern (Pteridium aquilinum) experimenting….  I harvested several rhizomes from Dad’s property in rich loose soil under Red Alder (Alnus rubra).    The fronds are mostly dead and are starting to topple over.  I stretched one upward to its full extent and it measured 7’ tall.  The rhizomes are also quite large, but I wasn’t able to unearth an entire one although I got a few pieces that were more than 2’ long.  I washed the rhizomes and brought them home to cook.  I initially steamed about 1/3 of the rhizomes for an hour.  When they cooled they had a molasses like aroma and I peeled one with a carrot peeler and found the peelings to be very sticky on the inner surfaces.  Without further preparation I chewing on the rhizome and found the initial flavor sweet.  As I chewed an unpleasant bitter flavor dominated and I spat it all out.  So far the smell and the taste are similar to my limited experiences with Wood Fern (Dryopteris expansa) rhizomes.

Bracken Fern rhizome cross section
Using the base of a heavy wooden spoon, I pounded the remaining portion of the peeled rhizome and was easily able to separate the dark central fibers from the rest of the rhizome.  I picked through the pounded rhizome strands and tasted some pieces that didn’t have any dark fibers and found their flavor agreeable, which leads me to believe that the bitter flavor is concentrated in the dark colored fibers in the rhizome.  I finally feel like I am making some progress on the Bracken Fern front.

Peeled Bracken Fern rhizome
I continued steaming the remaining rhizomes from my first batch for another hour and peeled them.  They now have a smell reminiscent of potato chips.  I will let them dry for a day or two in the hope that the dry starch will pulverize into flour while the dark fibers remain intact enough to be separated with a sieve.

Pounded Bracken Fern rhizome
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