Bast

 

(Before reading this post, forgive me about the choppy lay-out, i was unable to figure

 out how my blog works today, hopefully i will work out the glitches in the next few days'

as i plan to be blogging in the month of November, nanowrimo)

 

Recently we had a big wind storm here and a few old growth White Spruce in our yard

 blew down.

And simultaneously  I had  been introduced to Alek. Alek like me turned out a lover of eating

 wild foods, 

nibbling on everything we came across on a hike. No fear of dying of just a nibble. Which

 we both felt

 withholds many people from eating wild woods, the fear of dying. 

Also related to my study of Botany in the days of that wind storm i had been researching

 in  the book

 ‘long ago person found’. By accident i found that in the stomach of this long ago person

 Spruce Bast

 was found to be in his diet. Alek, on that hike, had been asking me about the inner bark

, cambium o

r bast of Birches, to be used for flour, food.

Hence the Two downed White Spruces in my yard, they  put it all together. 

And in between clearing snow, we had an half meter snowfall after the storm, i would

 dredge through

  the snow to one of the downed spruces,  It was a gigantic one, say 50 feet length

 and 60 cm diameter

 at the base. Big for our semi arid region, It’s age i suspect a few hunderd years.

And sawing away the bark i discovered a spot with a cm thick layer of cambium.

 The tree totally

 deteriorated in the core, the cambium spotted. I do not know what the cambium

 of a younger healthier

 tree would like like.

I could see though that the cambium was not the same thickness every where 

, a thing i had read

 on line. Not much on google though about Spruce Cambium and it’s edibility ,

 almost nil and whatever

 i found was hardly relevant.

I scraped of the cambium with a knife, with gloved hands stuffed the scrapes i could

 catch in my pocket.

Nibbling i found the taste and texture surprising palatable. Do note i enjoy a various

 amount  of extreme

 tastes, and cut most sugar out of my diet. The low sugar intake to me is paramount

 to enjoy new foods.

Later offering it to others, the reactions were...wonderful:  “yak too bitter” , “ it tastes

 like firewood”,

 “it tastes like wood, oh now i have a piece of wood stuck between my teeth."

But happily to me everyone was nibbling. Alek of course was

 the only one who

 said, ”Yes! That is ok”.

I tested people out on election night, bringing a dish of woodchips ( cambium 

, dried rhubarb and

 chocolate.

I knew for the job of harvesting i needed my log peeler, but  could not find it

. I went to ‘my’ tree with

 a hatchet, small axe, that worked better then the saw and knife, but still no

t a way to harvest

 a reasonable amount to actually use as flour.

Yesterday i searched the whole work shop for the tool i needed. And yes after

i said to my husband 

, “Don i searched the whole shop and did not find it” , i turned my head and there

 it was.

And yes! This proved to be the tool to harvest a bigger amount, now do not think

 anything big, first i

t is not me to harvest large amounts of anything  and still this tree was life recently

 but old and a hardy

 bark, and we are talking lots of snow to deal with.

So i harvest a cup full of scrapings

This morning i put it in my grinder with some plantain sees and some rumex seeds

 and made

 a good looking flower, now that i mixed with the same amount of whole wheat flour,

 and made

 pancakes. Cranberry pancakes that is.

Hmmm the spruce tree taste was not there, but the bitterness yes, next time

 i have to try it withou

t cranberries.

And as long as i do not feel like a grouse that i have to start eating gravel,

 to activate a gizzard

 i don’t have,  i will keep experimented and upping the dose.

 

( sorry for the chopped up lay-out, lots of issues here posting on my blog, i forgot how it worked,

hmmm strange, how it's workings do not make sense.)