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| Valley Oak A-corn Bread |
Spread upon a large cookie sheet, the Valley
Oak (Quercus lobata) acorns that I
collected last month are a constant temptation. The acorns are just so big!
Even though I usually dry my acorns completely before shelling them, I wanted to share the process with some
college friends that were visiting, so we shelled a pint that were not yet dry, and cooked up my first batch of Valley
Oak acorn bread.
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| This (left) Valley Oak acorn split itself open as it sprouted |
Valley Oak acorns sprout in the late fall
and if given the chance, will rapidly send a tap root deep into the ground. Most
of the acorns I collected last month had just started to sprout, and several of
the shells were split along their entire length from the vital force of the growing nutmeat. A few acorns even escaped their shells completely! Late season
harvesting has advantages since only healthy (weevil free) acorns will sprout,
and expansion-fractured shells are a cinch to remove by hand. However, on low
mast years, all the late season acorns might already be cached by the squirrels.
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| Partially dried Valley Oak acorns |
Acorns that haven’t hatched themselves
out of their shell can still be easily processed if the nuts are completely dry.
Acorn nutmeat shrinks by up to about 10 percent as it dries, and the shells become brittle,
allowing them to crack easily. If you shake an acorn that is sufficiently dry,
you should be able to feel the nutmeat rattle inside of the shell. Hurried by
temptation, I struggled to remove the shells from the acorns that were still
fresh, but hadn’t split themselves open. Using a nutcracker was like trying to
crack open a gummy bear, because both shell and nutmeat were still soft, so I finally
resorted to slicing open the shells with a paring knife. The nutmeat came out
of the shell free from the bitter brown seed coat, which clings to other
species such as Black Oak (Quercus kelloggii).
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| Shelled acorns ready to blend into flour |
Some species of acorns (like Garry Oak) oxidize
rapidly when shelled fresh, but my Valley Oak acorns appeared to be amazingly stable.
I put 2 cups of shelled acorns into a Vita-mix with 2 cups of water, and
blended them into a fine flour batter. Then I poured the batter into a gallon
sized mason jar and filled it with water, which I changed every day for several
days (for more information about this process, see How to Eat
an Acorn). After 3 days the batter was only slightly astringent, and after
5 days, it was almost completely free of all bitter/astringent constituents.
Katrina used the batter to make her a-corn bread recipe, which turned out
amazingly delicious- almost like a butterscotch brownie! Of all the cold-leached acorns I have tried, they are among my favorite, perhaps second only to Garry Oak acorns. Valley Oak acorns are actually less bitter than Garry Oak acorns, but also slightly less flavorful.
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