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OT Nuts

We have mostly ignored the big old butternut tree at the corner of our kitchen for years. Just snarled at it for drawing squirrels to us. DH has decided that this year we should make a serious go at getting some nuts from it. Now that is definitely a fine notion, butternuts are a good rich nut. You might call them white walnuts or oilnuts where you live.

Normal procedure with husking butternuts is to dry them, kick the dried husks off, give them a wash, and dry them again. If you have to, and you have strong hands and good gloves, you can strip the undried husks off like you would black walnuts. Thing is, we live in town. So we don't have a lot of space for drying, nor a proper drying shed. I'm thinking about putting together an old style indoor slat and cheesecloth dryer, I have a design for one in one of my cookbooks. I'm not sure how much that will do in terms of finished nuts though. If I put them on the kitchen roof the squirrels will make off with them, to say nothing of the mad scramble if it rains.

I have joked with DH that we had just ought to crawl up into the kitchen ceiling and nab the ones the squirrels harvest. That bit of space makes a fine nut drying place and the squirrels figured that out before ever we moved in! In fact last time we had butternuts off that tree was when they replaced my kitchen roof. The numbwits that did the work gave me no warning and didn't come in and take down the suspended ceiling tiles before stripping the old roof. So the first time they dropped anything it came right through my ceiling knocking a couple tiles askew, and letting what felt like a gross ton of butternuts fall directly on me where I was rolling out pie dough. While I was "speaking gently to them" ( in terms that would make a sailor pale), the DDs gathered up all the nuts, and they and DH had a fine old time while he taught them how to tell the eatable ones from the rest.

So anyway, if anybody has any clever walnut husking techniques they could share, I would appreciate it.

NightMist just nattering on today

Reply to
NightMist
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I saw an epidode of Good Eats that showed how to make a food dehydrator with a cardboard box and a fan. Something like this might work for you. Or there's the British-style drying cupboard, usually built over the hot water heater.

Reply to
frood

No husking advice. But you could dry them vertically in old nylon stockings hung in a well-ventilated room. (Maybe run a fan for a while.) Roberta in D

"NightMist" schrieb im Newsbeitrag news: snipped-for-privacy@news.madbbs.com...

Reply to
Roberta Zollner

this may not be of much use but when drying fruit one sometimes puts the fruit on a baking sheet in the oven set at the lowest setting with the door open just a tad - this might work on the nuts

Reply to
Jessamy

I know nothing about the nuts - but my bedroom furniture is made of Butternut wood ;-)

Reply to
Bonnie NJ

My mother just hung them in cheesecloth bundles in the attic or in the garage. About 30 nuts per "bag". We usually only managed about 3 bags. They don't smell compared to other things we've hung to dry. But this does take a while. She often took the bags down the same time she was hanging up new ones.

-georg

Reply to
Georg

Reply to
Taria

You, Georg, and Jessamy, have given me suggestions that when combined yield the slat and cheesecloth drier. It is a loose sort of a box with slide out slat shelves hung over the stove in a cheesecloth bag. Even Roberta's suggestion of going vertical comes in as the shelves are stacked several high. I reckon I was on the right track after all. I just have to sort out a safe place to hang them.

NightMist

Reply to
NightMist

ohh that sounds like a handy thing to have in the house :-)

I'm glad I was of help - I didn't think what I came up with would be helpful but mentioned it just in case :-)

Reply to
Jessamy

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