Pine is Fine

March 19, 2013

Eating Pine — Nibbling on Pine

Tree eating is growing on me. Last year, I developed an appreciation for a variety of edible tree buds, leaves, fruits, nuts and even saps, but harvesting the inner bark to make flour just didn’t tempt me. Just not that hungry.I gave a copy of Linda’s great book, Eat the Trees, to a wild foodie friend, Taylor and she is the impetus for expanding my horizon beyond the easy pickins to the inner gifts of trees.

Pine is an amazing gift. Not only is the whole tree edible but it’s medicinal qualities are stellar. It is anti microbial, anti septic, an expectorant, high in Vitamin C… to name a few of it’s virtues. It was too cold to collect sap but that is on my ‘bucket list’. Though I have great respect for this tree I can’t say my stomach growls with anticipation of eating it. It is considered a starvation food. The tea however is lovely and Pine needle popsicles are a tasty Summer treat. 🙂 The whole tree has edible and nutritious gifts: pine nuts, catkins, needles, twigs, inner bark, sap for it’s healing qualities…

*shopping for pine

We headed to the top of the mountain where there is a Pine forest and decided to select a branch to bring home and work with as needed. Skipper joined us.

This branch looked particularly tasty.

*Taylor cutting branch

Taylor, having worked for the conservation core in Arizona for two years, was a handy helper to have around. She finished off this limb in no time. Skipper barked encouragement.

*Cutting bark

Beginning the process of cutting out the inner bark. It was not as easy as the books imply. But then we found out that it was difficult because we were doing it wrong…

*Tori's knife

My friend, Tori, gifted me with a Swedish made Morah knife, which I carry with me almost always. I was or rather am afraid that this abuse may have harmed it in some way. Taylor assured me that this is what Morah knives were crafted for. The inner bark NEVER peeled off in sweet curls (as the pictures on the net and in books promised) so we improvised and made horizontal gashes and then sledgehammered out chunks a bit at a time.

Though the smell of Pine was heavy in the air I am afraid that we would have starved if it were up to our ability to really ‘bring home the bacon’. My mentor, Linda Runyon, used to whip up a meal of Pine in no time. She would have laughed at us but I’m sure she would be proud that we at least attempted this. I’ll send her pics!

*Taylor dragging pine branch

Heading back to the truck with our Pine branch. The freezing temps didn’t phase us. Harvesting that tiny bit of Pine burned up a few calories.

*in the truck

Using her keen sense of leverage and balance (highly tuned as an acroyoga instructor) Taylor flipped the heavy Pine branch into my trusty truck bed for the trip home.

*stripping needles

Taylor stripped the fresh needles off of our branch to make balsamic vinegar, Pine medicine and Pine honey, we also enjoyed some steaming mugs of Pine needle tea. 🙂

*the wrong stuff

After all that work, this is all we ended up with. Dehydrating the Pine bark my kitchen smelled like a lumber mill. With the moisture now sucked out of it I bagged it up till I grind it into flour and bake my first ever Pine bark bread. Which I’m sure with enough butter and wild jam on it it will taste passable.

*cutting up needles

Pine needle popsicles

Pine needles are delicious IF you don’t eat them by themselves. I’ve determined that eating Pine needles is perhaps similar to chewing on broom bristles. I do love them infused in a tea or vinegar or honey or on a hot Summer day as popsicles!

BACK TO THE DRAWING BOARD.

Experiment number 2. My wild friend, Heather Pier, has been successfully consuming Pine cambium in a plethora of tasty nutritious ways which is a far cry from Taylor’s and my Pine lumber that we harvested last time. With a bit of her help Taylor and I managed to figure out what the cambium is, and harvested enough to feed a small gerbil or two. She sent us this helpful link and these words of wisdom.

Holly, I did take some pics, but you really can’t tell much. But I did find this great video that shows it really well (if you can get past the music). The big thing that I work at is the change in textures between the bark, the cambium and the inner hard wood. The cambium is soft and slippery. But this video is almost exactly what happened with my pines, although I used a draw knife. Also, he boils it, which I thought was just nasty.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0adsYgaQpY0

Sacki-Survival Part 7 – Cambium as survival food

www.youtube.com

So back to the Pine forest to get just the cambium layer. There is something rather mysterious about a Pine forest…. the wind sounds strangely muffled…different…and the strong Pine odor carries me miles and years away to Pine forests of my past. Pine cones for wild crafts littered the crunchy pine needle floor… (note to self). Taylor is a determined soul and worked hard to harvest cambium from this tree. Our observations: it’s preferable to harvest fresh cambium from a newly fallen limb. So we went home and carved up the ‘yard art Pine branch’ that we had carted home last time. It was a piece of cake, sort of.

*second attempt at inner bark

*inner bark

So here is the skinny…. the pine INNER bark that we gouged out last time is not tasty. It is like eating a pine board from the hardware store, but the middle layer is the live cambium found JUST under the protective outer bark. This is moist and it tastes like Pine nuts (which I love). I dehydrated a bunch of this and can’t wait to make it into flour. Heather, just sent me her Pine flour donut recipe and I will be experimenting soon.

*the contrast

To the left is the inner Pine lumber (not edible) but useful for starting fires, in the middle is the edible Pine cambium, the right is the outer bark.

*dehydrating

Dehydrating the cambium strips for Pine flour. It actually makes really decent chewing gum as is. 🙂

Our search for Pine sap was futile though….

Taylor also made her first infused oils and tinctures, using Black Birch and Cottowood buds for the oils, Willow and Black Birch with Scotch whiskey or potato vodka. Pine twigs are in the basket to the right in groups of 12 for wild Popsicle sticks. 🙂

We ground up dried Pine needles (using a coffee grinder) into Pine flour and used that a a portion of the flour ingredient for our Double Pine Salvodoran Quesidillas. Recipe shared by wild woman Butter Wilde from Hunger and Thirst for Life.

*making pine muffins

Taylor ground the dried Pine needles into powder using my ‘coffee’ grinder that I never use for coffee. Worked well. She added this to the batter to get that Pine zing. Here she is topping the muffins with Pine nuts.

*Double Pine Salvadorean Quesadillas

I’ll be serving Triple Pine muffins made with the ground Pine cambium flour at my next wild food class. I know it will be a huge hit!

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About the Author

Holly Drake

My name is Holly Drake and I love to study, teach, and talk about wild foods. I live in the beautiful Appalachian Mountains of North Carolina with my husband Jason and my dog Max where I explore the beauty of God's creation to learn as much as I can about wild foods that are available to us for free. [READ ALL ARTICLES]