Fall Forage I Was Too Lazy To Post - Cattail Flour

Last fall while wandering the woods behind our building I found a path that went right down to the river's edge next to a stand of cattails. 

 I had always read that cattail roots were a great source of flour so I decided to root around in the muck. I took a garden weasel, a bucket, and some hand shears to see what I could find.  After a short learning curve I was able to pick out a few choice roots.

Covered in muck I dragged them back to the picnic table and gave them a quick scrub.

The hard part was keeping the muck out of the broken ends and the smashed sections.  I washed them better in the sink and then peeled the outer layer off of them, discarding the bits that had gotten muddy.

I found at this point the easiest way to separate the starch from the pulp was to immerse them in water and then just work all the fiber until the starch falls out, then decant and dry.  I also tried drying the roots then mashing the flour off it, this was much more labor intensive though there was a color difference in the flour.

You can see the dried then separated on the left.

I had also tried boiling sections of the root, this didn't do anything to help the starch fall off but it did cook it into something resembling a potato with fibers in it.  If I were lost in the woods this would probably be the best way to turn those cattail roots into something palatable.  I might also try in the future to make chicha using this method, it will probably be way easier than chewing on all that dried cornmeal.

Early Boxelder (Maple) Sugaring, I Make My Own Spiles.

Looking at the weather forecast last week I saw the upcoming week's temperatures would cycle in the range that is good for sugaring maples.  I have been procrastinating buying spiles for about a month now, and last Thursday I decided I would try to make my own out of some scrap tubing I had lying around.

Here is what I came up with.  I would say it was better than paying a couple dollars each but I broke my bandsaw blade in the process.  A bit of scrounging and 4 extension cords later I headed out to the treeline and installed it in a boxelder tree growing out back.

After installing it I promptly forgot about it until Sunday morning.  I headed out to check the pail.  It had collected a quart of sap, not much but enough to see if there was a decent sugar content.  I boiled it down on the stove until it was very thick and then stuck it in a 250° oven to drive the rest of the water off.

There was my yield out of that first quart, 3/8oz.  This would work out to 1.5oz/gallon of sap.  The Lohman's maples yielded 2oz/gal in previous averages, and the previous time I sugared this particular tree I got an amazing 4oz/gal, though reading through previous posts I only yielded 2 gallons of sap (and I can't remember if I got more after that post.)  I suspect the yield was low because it is so early in the season.  In the 2 intervening days I found about a quart each day, and that little jar is now full to the top of sugar.  I have yet to weigh that but I will give weekly totals as this season goes on.

I personally prefer to take the sap all the way to sugar because the first time I sugared maples some of my syrup got moldy.  In a sugar state it is a lot more shelf stable, and I could always rehydrate it into syrup if I wanted.

Oh, and for Sharon who asked about bird poop getting in the bucket, it seems ants are a bigger problem.  Filtration is still the solution.