Anyone cook with Acorns?

meanwhile · #1 10/22/12, 07:49 PM

Cooking with acorns? Anyone cook with acorns? How? Recipe? Taste good? Worth the trouble?

I read online that acorns have to be boiled to get the shells off and then boiled more to get tannins out and then boiled more and empty water and boiled more. Then toast them?

Anyone eat them regularly? If so, how do you cook them? Thank you.

am1too · #2 10/22/12, 09:09 PM

Really depends on what kind of acorns one has.

For instance black jack acorns have lots of tannin.

But I eat post oak acorns raw. They are great IMO.

jwal10 · #3 10/22/12, 09:13 PM

We have white oaks here, not too bad made into flour. Pancakes and breads, mostly biscuits....James

meanwhile · #4 10/22/12, 09:30 PM

How? How to cook with them? Do you boil and then roast?

Anyone cook with them?

kareninaustria · #5 10/23/12, 04:48 AM

Lots of info on acorn preparation!

Acorn and Wild Tuber and Nut Recipes | Hunter Angler Gardener Cook

willow_girl · #6 10/23/12, 07:06 AM

I feed them to my goat!

It's amusing to watch a goat eating an acorn.

Perhaps I am easily amused.

jwal10 · #7 10/23/12, 07:39 AM

Acorn Recipes and Acorn Preparation - Grandpappy's Basic Recipes - by Robert Wayne Atkins, P.E.

meanwhile · #8 10/23/12, 08:08 AM

Thank you. I see now that we need to figure out which acorns are from the red oak and which ones are from white oaks. Good links. Thank you.

willow girl: no goats here but sometimes I wonder.....lots of boys around here.

tinknal · #9 10/23/12, 08:38 AM

Red oaks have smooth caps on the acorns, white oaks have fuzzy caps (hence the name "bur" oak).

jwal10 · #10 10/23/12, 08:44 AM

The World´s Tree Species: Oregon White Oak - Quercus garryana

uncle Will in In. · #11 10/23/12, 08:50 AM

Several years ago, we had a milk cow that ate a bunch of acorns one day. It dryed her up the same day and she never came back to giving close to the amount of milk she had been giving.

ronbre · #12 10/23/12, 10:10 AM

you can remember red oaks have pointy leaves (like arrows) and white oaks have rounded leaf ends (like bullets)..think the french/indian wars when you are looking for oaks

meanwhile · #13 10/23/12, 05:17 PM

We have three types acorns in the basket but forgot to check to see what acorn belongs to which tree. The boys are going out again tomorrow and try again. I am not sure I have time this week to do all that boiling and boiling and roasting and then boiling again.

Might just have to wait on that little project.

We are stripping the BB size pellets off the red sumac this week to make lemonade. That will take time too. Thanks everyone.

Pony · #14 10/23/12, 06:45 PM

Our goats eat the acorns and they love oak leaves, too. Has not affected the milk quantity or quality. Butchered a wether over the weekend, and one of his stomachs had quite a few acorns in it. He sure was a tasty little guy (we roasted him whole in a pit - completely different story....)

Wish we had a piggie to fatten, because this has been a fantastic mast year!

Okay, as for human consumption, you've gotten some nice links. If you have Carla Emery's Encyclopedia of Country Living, there's a section in there with directions for preparing acorns.

If you do try it, post here and let us know how it works for you!

meanwhile · #15 10/24/12, 01:58 PM

I don't think we are going to do all that boiling and boiling. Someone who has done it before told me the smell is horrible and stinks up the whole house and yard for days. We are having a Wild Food "look and cook" class out here this weekend and I will find something else wild to cook that does not stink so much and take three days.

We have some red sumac to make lemon aid and some wild greens too.

Thanks everyone.

Whisperwindkat · #16 10/25/12, 03:48 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by meanwhile

I don't think we are going to do all that boiling and boiling. Someone who has done it before told me the smell is horrible and stinks up the whole house and yard for days. We are having a Wild Food "look and cook" class out here this weekend and I will find something else wild to cook that does not stink so much and take three days.

We have some red sumac to make lemon aid and some wild greens too.

Thanks everyone.

No they don't stink. We have only red oak varieties on our farm and I process acorns every year. I usually use the boiling water method as it is quicker than letting them soak and there is no risk of mold by boiling. The actually smell kind of nice. A woodsy, clean scent. Blessings, Kat

meanwhile · #17 10/25/12, 06:13 AM

Whispterwindkat: How many times do you have to boil them? Can you give me more tips? I read the acorns must be boiled four to five times in lots of water, then roasted? Do you roast them or just use boiled? Thanks for suggestions.

I like your web site. Just took a quick look but did not see instructions about the acorns? If tips are there, can you point me to it? Thanks so much.

jwal10 · #18 10/25/12, 07:13 AM

We have white oaks. If we are using them right away, wet, we remove the shell, cold rinse them and grind. We dry in a solar dryer, crack and store in freezer bags in the freezer. Then if using whole or chopped, add them to boiling water, let set 5 minutes, drain, put in another pan of boiling water with salt added for several minutes, drain and then dry, roast and/or chop, depending on use. Do not rinse or let them cool off between the 2 boilings as it locks in the tannins. For dry meal (flour) we don't add salt. You can dry and store them in the shell for 3-4 months but the flavor and moisture goes away pretty quickly. In the freezer they are good up to 9 months or so. I like to get them out of the shell as soon as possible, sort them, throw away the bad ones. I don't like having buggy food around but always dry the acorns in their shell because it keeps the moisture and flavor in the nut. Cracking and then drying will dry out the nut meat....James

foxtrapper · #19 10/25/12, 07:43 AM

Look at the leaves to figure out tannin content. The sharper the leaves, the sharper the bite. The rounder the leaves, the rounder the taste.

Boiling creates no stink, just a mild nut scent. The meats will darken. Cool water soaking is proported to work well at leaching tannin also. Personally, I've found both methods to be rather ineffective myself. The water will continuously darken, regardless of the number of changes; the meats gradually darken and sorta shrivel, flavor fades, and the tannin bite never actually departs.

Toasting creates hard little rocks, with little pleasant taste. Drying works, and if the base nut isn't high in tannin, it's a mild soft nut with a bit of tannin bite.

I do tend to peel and skin the nuts prior to drying. I find it far easier to remove the inner skin early, as opposed to when it has dried.

I have not cooked with acorns, simply eaten them.

meanwhile · #20 10/25/12, 08:32 AM

Thank you everyone. It sounds like a long process for a product that may or may not taste good. We have collected a bucket full and plan to have those on hand with printed instructions but I don't think we are going to cook any for the Saturday class.

We found wild walnuts, red sumac, locust pods and have a few types of wild greens for the class. Thank you.