There is actually a third leaching process. The indigenous tribes of California used alternating hot and cold water to more quickly leach out the tannins, without losing the starches in the acorn meal. They'd pour over boiling hot water, and after a few moments, pour over very cold water. They'd do this over and over until it was ready (typically around four hours). I work as a tour guide in Yosemite, and your videos, along with my historical research has really helped me in finding a means of making an authentic food that made up over 85 percent of most native Californian's diets.
@@FeralForaging There’s an old stock footage video of one of the indigenous guides (Maggie Howard/Tabucee) in Yosemite making acorn bread on UA-cam called “Bread From Acorns (1933),” that shows the old process being performed. They’d often mix crushed manzanita berry skins into the meal as a natural sweetener, adding a mild cider flavor.
Most of them did it passively... For example in a basket tied off in running water.. It does take a bit longer. But it freed up one for multitasking. Thank you for the informative upload;)@FeralForaging
the other day I found an “oak apple” growing on one of my oak tree’s leaves, (an “oak apple” is an overgrowth from the leaf that quite resembles a grape that grows around an egg of a type of whasp). At the time I was unaware of this and I ate the “oak apple”. Afterwards I looked it up 😂 So yeah, I ate a bug egg by mistake. But anyway, the oak apple tasted just like a tart grape.
What is the longest the leaching has taken for you? I had a batch that I changed ~5-10 times a day for 6 days and it was still bitter, did it just need more time?
About 10 days. The amount of water that use use compared to flour you are leaching and how fine the flour is can make a huge difference in leaching time. So keep that in mind'
Mostly baked flat breads with other seed flours blended in and on occasion fruit chunks that have been dried. Im going to dry some persimmon after the acorn flour is done. I could even dry the persimmons to a bone dry state and grind that into persimmon flour to blend in with the flour.
So I collected a second batch of acorns and the meat inside is orange inside of all of them. Is this type of acorn good? Or can it only be the white meat?
Mine is done leaching (cold method) and now I am drying. I put mine in an oat nut bag and drained out most of the water. I then took that and froze it until today. I put it out in the sun to partially dry while I cleaned out my dehydrator. I now have 5 racks drying in my dehydrator right now. I did not blend mine in the blender first. I ran mine through my hand grinder first. Once dry I'll once again run it through the hand grinder until I have suitable flour for my bread. I wish I had gone out to forage manzanita berries. Those make some nice tasty flour too once dried and ground into flour. I mix it with my bread.
@@FeralForaging Yes, Im out in Northern California. We have loads of it out here. We gather the ripe fruit and then soak them in hot water to make a tea. It is mild and sweet. Naturally sweet not processed sugar sweet. Then you remove the pulp and let it dry completely then grind it all into flour and blend with the acorn flour.
That’s awesome. It sounds like a dry version of how we use persimmon here for persimmon bread pudding. You have some pretty awesome oak species for acorns over there too!
@@FeralForaging I know back east in Missouri they have persimmon that are real tiny and from what I remember a burnt orange color and super sweet. I'd love to get why hand on one of those. Yes. we have a very large variety of Oak out here. We have a large persimmon tree with those that get real soft when ripe. Not the flat persimmon. Ours are great for the bread pudding. We have a great recipe for the bread pudding handed down but I think it is still a common recipe.
What kind of acorns were those? And how do they compare to other nuts regarding their balance of starches, proteins, and oil and how it might affect how to use them?
I have 5 acorn trees, but the seeds looks different they are smaller than yours and more elongated.do you think could Ido the flour with this kind of acorn?
@Feral Foraging Everytime I try to grind the flour after drying it out in the dehydrator, I always deal with some harder-to-grind pieces of dried flour. I tried putting them into a processor and I tried the mortar and pestle method. Any tips please?
A few questions/suggestions. 1. I feel like the blended water slurry would cause lots of nutrients to be lost. Thoughts? 2. Would a ph strip tester help determine when the water leeching is complete? 3. Would purchasing a flour grinder make the grinding faster and more consistent? Thansk for the video
Your videos are awesome! I got a foraging book a few years ago and have been reading through it. Our oak tree dropped acorns this year and I was wanting to try making acorn flour. Did the towel and meat tenderizer trick and it worked!
fastest leeching with alcohol, 60% water 40% alcohol (vodka) at 86F to 104F in 3 hours it removes tannins, then use calcium hydrate (cal, slaked lime)to remove the tannin from the alcohol, reuse that alcohol, the tannin rich calcium hydrate can be used to tann leather or in large quantities sold to leather tanners.
video molto interessante sto facendo anche io la farina di ghiande sto cercando qualche consiglio per alcune ricette potresti darmi qualche dritta..un salutone e grazie mille
Question for ya if you're able: I (foolishly) missed a day in changing out my water and one of my two jars fermented a bit (i.e. bubbles rising to the surface). There isn't any off flavor or other signs of hard core spoilage, but would you abandon that jar? My intuition says it'll probably be okay.
Sour dough is just intentional fermenting. I don’t think a bit of unintentional fermenting would be an issue! This has happened to me before and I didn’t have any ill effects.
I have followed step-by-step up to this point. My acorns came out of the dehydrator much darker in color, which you said was ok. I added at least as much water as acorns, but after several batches, I burned out my blender. Consistency of acorns themselves was like stone ground mustard (plus water). I’m only one third into grinding and have to buy a new blender. Really frustrated. Wishing I had not started this project, but I have already spent so much time on it, I hate to throw in the towel. Your thoughts?
I’m sorry you’ve run into trouble. Two ideas come to mind. 1-make sure to let the acorns rehydrate and get soft before trying to blend them. 2-if your blender is having trouble, add even more water. However much it takes to be easier on the blender. You really can’t add too much because you’ll pour it off in the end anyway. Also maybe your blender blades aren’t able to get the acorns fine enough.
I have cold leached several batches of acorn flour and usually keeping it on the counter top works just fine. The one thing you have to be aware of is that in warmer temperatures, the starch can start to ferment while the flour is leaching, so if you are doing this process in warmer months, it may be beneficial to refrigerate. Hope that helps!
Thank you so much for doing this video. I do have one question: Should the shells be removed before drying the acorn meat or do we let the meat dry in the shells then crack them open to start the leaching process?
In my experience, acorns are very oily and prone to molding in the shells. And, if you leave them out to dry in the shell, weavils may be in them and ruin many of the nuts. If you collect a bunch and can't process immediately, putting them in the freezer will stop the mold and the weavils until you can process the nuts.
I do wonder what you're pouring down the drain, nutritionally, beyond tannins. Is there a difference between acorn flour leached in large pieces, and that done as you describe in the video, as flour, nutritionally speaking?
@@RICDirector I would imagine that at the end of the day, if you've leached a certain amount of tannins and some other water-soluble components go out with it, the amount of them would same regardless of the surface area, the only difference being how long that takes! Just my guess though!
One year late I know, but I bet you'd be able to use it as a mordent for dyeing natural textiles. Tannin is used in a lot of dying so it may be a neat thing to experiment with
Im going to make blackberry muffins from the acorns and berries in my yard, and since i dont have any cows or chickens ill have to go raid the neighbors barn at night for some milk, eggs, and butter 🚓👮♀️🧁 MISDEMEANOR MUFFINS
There is actually a third leaching process. The indigenous tribes of California used alternating hot and cold water to more quickly leach out the tannins, without losing the starches in the acorn meal. They'd pour over boiling hot water, and after a few moments, pour over very cold water. They'd do this over and over until it was ready (typically around four hours). I work as a tour guide in Yosemite, and your videos, along with my historical research has really helped me in finding a means of making an authentic food that made up over 85 percent of most native Californian's diets.
Very cool! Thanks for the info. :D Have you seen our Acorn Series from this year? I've uploaded a lot more videos as shorts.
@@FeralForaging I haven’t checked out all of the shorts yet, but I definitely plan to!
@@FeralForaging There’s an old stock footage video of one of the indigenous guides (Maggie Howard/Tabucee) in Yosemite making acorn bread on UA-cam called “Bread From Acorns (1933),” that shows the old process being performed. They’d often mix crushed manzanita berry skins into the meal as a natural sweetener, adding a mild cider flavor.
i was also thinking of the creek leaching method which was also used by indigienous peoples to just leach large batches over long periods of time.
@@uarestrong76 Definitely a process used, typically when there was an abundance of supply.
Is it necessary to dry acorns before water leaching if you are not storing your acorns ? ?
No, just makes cracking easier
Thank you!
this would be a looooooot of work especially without the electric equipment, but what an incredible food source for survival in the woods
Totally, adds respect to the native groups that processed acorns for food!
Most of them did it passively... For example in a basket tied off in running water.. It does take a bit longer. But it freed up one for multitasking. Thank you for the informative upload;)@FeralForaging
That was seriously one of the coolest things I've ever seen. I had no idea you could make bread (and flour) out of acorns! Mind blown!!!
Look into permaculture
I've collected acorns for a second time. Perfect timing to see this. Hopefully I'll get these processed. Thank you!
Best wishes! Feel free to reach out if you need any help!
I came here to learn how to make acorn flour for Korean acorn jelly. But now I also want to make the bread!
the other day I found an “oak apple” growing on one of my oak tree’s leaves, (an “oak apple” is an overgrowth from the leaf that quite resembles a grape that grows around an egg of a type of whasp). At the time I was unaware of this and I ate the “oak apple”. Afterwards I looked it up 😂 So yeah, I ate a bug egg by mistake. But anyway, the oak apple tasted just like a tart grape.
.
Nice! i need to collect the acorns in my yard and make this. Have you ever tried making nut milk with hickory nuts? it is so good!
I’ve made a hickory infusion before, but not but milk! Is the method to just blend them and leave them in water for a bit and then strain later on?
Thank you 👍
Great presentation and information.
Thumbs up and a new sub.
You are welcome. Happy to have earned your sub!
What is the longest the leaching has taken for you? I had a batch that I changed ~5-10 times a day for 6 days and it was still bitter, did it just need more time?
About 10 days. The amount of water that use use compared to flour you are leaching and how fine the flour is can make a huge difference in leaching time. So keep that in mind'
How did people make acorn flour before the days of dehydrators and blenders?
Sun drying, and pounding them to a powder with rocks.
This was awesome! THANK YOU!!
Glad that you liked it! You are very welcome!
Squirrels punching the air rn
Brilliant, thank you, this was my missing link
You are very welcome, glad it was helpful!
Once you have your leached acorn flour, what do you hope to make with it! There are so many recipes in addition to bread. :D
Mostly baked flat breads with other seed flours blended in and on occasion fruit chunks that have been dried. Im going to dry some persimmon after the acorn flour is done. I could even dry the persimmons to a bone dry state and grind that into persimmon flour to blend in with the flour.
That sounds Delicious!💕
Bro are you cageside convos?
You can also put the flesh in a bag and leave it in a clean running stream.
If you are going to hydrate the acorns before grinding, why dry them in the first place? Why not leach them when they are fresh off the tree?
You could, put cracking would be a real pain. I dry to make preservation and cracking easier.
So I collected a second batch of acorns and the meat inside is orange inside of all of them. Is this type of acorn good? Or can it only be the white meat?
That is perfectly fine! I find a lot of species with acorns like that.
I want to try this with my own oak trees. But how you shell all them acorns?
The acorns I collected were mostly wormy! Grr. Now I have a pile of them sprouting.
Future oaks, future acorns! :D
Hey, super clear video, thanks! I have a question though, how long can you store the flour after processing?
If it's perfectly dried I imagine you can store it for a very long time!
@@FeralForaging Good to know, thanks!
So how would you do it without power? Or equipment? I think boiling would be the best option
Thanks for the info. I'm collecting acorns here in SoCal for the first time here we go
very dangerous activities! please be careful with firearms!
His explanation and process seems to be feasible luckily I have two large oak trees in the back I'll have plenty of practice
Best of luck! Feel free to ask questions here.
Hot leeching will infuse the tannins into the flour. I cannot find your video #2
🌿🌰🧠🌰🌿
Mine is done leaching (cold method) and now I am drying. I put mine in an oat nut bag and drained out most of the water. I then took that and froze it until today. I put it out in the sun to partially dry while I cleaned out my dehydrator. I now have 5 racks drying in my dehydrator right now. I did not blend mine in the blender first. I ran mine through my hand grinder first. Once dry I'll once again run it through the hand grinder until I have suitable flour for my bread. I wish I had gone out to forage manzanita berries. Those make some nice tasty flour too once dried and ground into flour. I mix it with my bread.
I haven’t foraged manzanita before! Are you from out west? I don’t we have them on the east coast.
@@FeralForaging Yes, Im out in Northern California. We have loads of it out here. We gather the ripe fruit and then soak them in hot water to make a tea. It is mild and sweet. Naturally sweet not processed sugar sweet. Then you remove the pulp and let it dry completely then grind it all into flour and blend with the acorn flour.
That’s awesome. It sounds like a dry version of how we use persimmon here for persimmon bread pudding. You have some pretty awesome oak species for acorns over there too!
@@FeralForaging I know back east in Missouri they have persimmon that are real tiny and from what I remember a burnt orange color and super sweet. I'd love to get why hand on one of those. Yes. we have a very large variety of Oak out here. We have a large persimmon tree with those that get real soft when ripe. Not the flat persimmon. Ours are great for the bread pudding. We have a great recipe for the bread pudding handed down but I think it is still a common recipe.
Here is my little video of me grinding acorn into flour. ua-cam.com/video/EWeZDNCSIXw/v-deo.html
Don't you lose a lot of nutrients by grinding the meat before leaching?
What kind of acorns were those? And how do they compare to other nuts regarding their balance of starches, proteins, and oil and how it might affect how to use them?
It's 6% protein, 15 to 25% fat and mostly carbs
can we use an oven on the lowest setting to dry the acorn flour or do we need a dehydrator?
Excellent video, Jesse! Loved the info packed explanation
Thank you, Ankur! :)
I have 5 acorn trees, but the seeds looks different they are smaller than yours and more elongated.do you think could Ido the flour with this kind of acorn?
Flour can be made from any kind of acorn.
This is my first time foraging acorns! I’m excited to have some acorn breads and desserts for thanksgiving
It’s the best!
Does fermentation neutralize tannins?
@Feral Foraging Everytime I try to grind the flour after drying it out in the dehydrator, I always deal with some harder-to-grind pieces of dried flour. I tried putting them into a processor and I tried the mortar and pestle method. Any tips please?
I put mine in a hand cranked coffee grinder !
I've watch several uploads on how to make acorn flour and this is the best
Thanks so much!
A few questions/suggestions.
1. I feel like the blended water slurry would cause lots of nutrients to be lost. Thoughts?
2. Would a ph strip tester help determine when the water leeching is complete?
3. Would purchasing a flour grinder make the grinding faster and more consistent?
Thansk for the video
How do you get the brown skin (testa) off the nut meat?
in the leaching process it generally floats to the top and is poured off, but some may be mixed in with the flour, it doesn’t ruin the taste
Please can you tell me why we go to the effort of drying the acorns if we are then going to submerge them in water? Thank you
To make cracking easier and to preserve in shell long term
Your videos are awesome! I got a foraging book a few years ago and have been reading through it. Our oak tree dropped acorns this year and I was wanting to try making acorn flour. Did the towel and meat tenderizer trick and it worked!
fastest leeching with alcohol, 60% water 40% alcohol (vodka) at 86F to 104F in 3 hours it removes tannins, then use calcium hydrate (cal, slaked lime)to remove the tannin from the alcohol, reuse that alcohol, the tannin rich calcium hydrate can be used to tann leather or in large quantities sold to leather tanners.
video molto interessante sto facendo anche io la farina di ghiande sto cercando qualche consiglio per alcune ricette potresti darmi qualche dritta..un salutone e grazie mille
Perfect timing. It’s acorn season 🌰 🌰 🌰
Indeed it is! My red oaks aren’t dropping this year, but it’s a mast year for chestnut oaks.
I’m leaching acorns for the first time, the water just started turning reddish :)
Grinding it before drying will make you lose some of the starch.
Question for ya if you're able: I (foolishly) missed a day in changing out my water and one of my two jars fermented a bit (i.e. bubbles rising to the surface). There isn't any off flavor or other signs of hard core spoilage, but would you abandon that jar? My intuition says it'll probably be okay.
Sour dough is just intentional fermenting. I don’t think a bit of unintentional fermenting would be an issue! This has happened to me before and I didn’t have any ill effects.
now you have me wondering about acorn booze and what that would be like
@@scooterdrue And me too! :D
fermenting it actually makes it healthier :D
Finaly, How do you storage the flour? you need keep on the fridge.
Please pin me
What, if any, acorns are better to use? Can you use any acorns from any kind of oak?
Did you dehydrate/dry the acorns before you cracked them?
Why?
all vitamins are gone with all that leaching!
Well, maybe some water soluble ones. 😅
Is there a shelf life duration to acorn flour stored in this way?
People better remember how to do this, plenty of oak trees out there.
I have followed step-by-step up to this point. My acorns came out of the dehydrator much darker in color, which you said was ok. I added at least as much water as acorns, but after several batches, I burned out my blender. Consistency of acorns themselves was like stone ground mustard (plus water). I’m only one third into grinding and have to buy a new blender. Really frustrated. Wishing I had not started this project, but I have already spent so much time on it, I hate to throw in the towel. Your thoughts?
I’m sorry you’ve run into trouble. Two ideas come to mind. 1-make sure to let the acorns rehydrate and get soft before trying to blend them. 2-if your blender is having trouble, add even more water. However much it takes to be easier on the blender. You really can’t add too much because you’ll pour it off in the end anyway. Also maybe your blender blades aren’t able to get the acorns fine enough.
That's so awesome!! thx!
You are very welcome! :)
Do you refrigerate the acorns during cold leaching or keep on counter? Appreciate your input. Happy foraging 🍂🍁🌰
I have cold leached several batches of acorn flour and usually keeping it on the counter top works just fine. The one thing you have to be aware of is that in warmer temperatures, the starch can start to ferment while the flour is leaching, so if you are doing this process in warmer months, it may be beneficial to refrigerate. Hope that helps!
Thank you so much for doing this video. I do have one question: Should the shells be removed before drying the acorn meat or do we let the meat dry in the shells then crack them open to start the leaching process?
In my experience, acorns are very oily and prone to molding in the shells. And, if you leave them out to dry in the shell, weavils may be in them and ruin many of the nuts. If you collect a bunch and can't process immediately, putting them in the freezer will stop the mold and the weavils until you can process the nuts.
I have a quation . When we make corns flour . Does it lose its nutrution value?
Inevitably some, but not all. Either way, eating them before leach just isn’t an option
Wow 🙏👍🙏❤from Malaysia
JESSE! WE NEED TO COOK!
Instead of dehydrating can you freeze dry?
I imagine that you could. If you try it, please let me know what the results are like.
Awesome
This is nice but you don't have to grind them into a flour to leech the tannins out you can do that right after you deshell them
In my experience it takes way longer to leach them whole because the surface area is so much smaller.
I do wonder what you're pouring down the drain, nutritionally, beyond tannins. Is there a difference between acorn flour leached in large pieces, and that done as you describe in the video, as flour, nutritionally speaking?
I'm honestly not sure. Where do you imagine the difference would come from?
@@FeralForaging Soluble nutrients which aren't bound to the tannins.....not sure of the chemistry, was just an intriguing question. :)
@@RICDirector I would imagine that at the end of the day, if you've leached a certain amount of tannins and some other water-soluble components go out with it, the amount of them would same regardless of the surface area, the only difference being how long that takes! Just my guess though!
One year late I know, but I bet you'd be able to use it as a mordent for dyeing natural textiles. Tannin is used in a lot of dying so it may be a neat thing to experiment with
Im going to make blackberry muffins from the acorns and berries in my yard, and since i dont have any cows or chickens ill have to go raid the neighbors barn at night for some milk, eggs, and butter 🚓👮♀️🧁 MISDEMEANOR MUFFINS