The benefits of eating acorns go beyond efficiency. Imagine what some of our forests would look like 200 years from now if acorn consumption were a goal of the management plan! Even more efficient than using this organic matter to feed our garden (which we do) is to eat from the forest directly. The forest is extremely efficient it captures more solar energy and creates more organic matter than any other ecosystem. Harvesting acorns removes only a tiny percentage of the organic matter in fact, the acorn was meant to be given away as seed.

This is a beautiful, closed nutrient cycle with a slight annual gain in fertility. Mother Earth does the work herself there, as trees capture sunlight, create organic matter and feed the very soil in which they grow. Will Bonsall ate a whole bowl of these crackers when we shared them with him.Īs a gardener who mulches religiously, I often look enviously at the forest floor. Form the batter into biscuits and bake for 15 to 20 minutes at 375 F. (For fat we use Maine-grown sunflower oil or lard.) Add water to make a moist but not runny batter. For a basic biscuit recipe that will please anyone, combine 2 cups of acorn flour with 1 cup of oat flour, add 2 tablespoons of good fat and 1/2 teaspoon salt. I like a dense, 95 percent acorn flat bread held together with 5 percent soaked ground flax. We make acorn-oatmeal porridge twice a week for breakfast with 50 to 75 percent acorn. Our daily bread is a delicious blend of 60 percent acorn and 40 percent sourdough spelt from the Webb Family Farm in Pittston, Maine. All acorns – whether from red or white oaks – are edible and all acorns contain enough tannin that leaching is a necessity. All our acorns come from the red oak, Quercus rubra, as that is our local oak. My family eats acorns in a variety of ways and uses 200 pounds of acorn flour a year. This article offers a practical guide to processing acorns, a glance at the crop’s agricultural implications, and a chance to change the world – for as with any food or product, its conscious production and consumption create powerful opportunities for social and environmental change. We are not playing we are making a living and playing. Not so at our Koviashuvik Local Living School, where every fall my family, friends, apprentices and I spend three wonderful mornings crawling around in the nearby red oak grove picking up acorns. The oak seed, which once sustained the bulk of human civilization, is now largely ignored as a food. In autumn, all over the world, something wonderful happens: The acorns fall. Photo courtesy of Chris and Ashirah Knapp. Processing acorns in a Davebilt nutcracker.

Making acorn flour