Sunday, October 12, 2014

Sunday Reading - Walnut Wonderland





Around here this time of year if Walnuts were worth something we would all be rich. They are literally falling off the trees like rain and it can sometimes be dangerous to stand under the big ones cause those nuts can gather up some speed let me tell you. Thankfully the green outside husk is usually beginning to get a bit squishy now so they do have a bit of give to em when they make contact.

Walnuts would be one of those crops much like beans. You gather em up and then wait for the long Winter nights of boredom to crack em open and get at the good stuff. The amount of protein, anti-oxidants and other nutrients inside the meat would actually make the effort of cracking them open worth while in a collapse situation when you could lounge by the fire and work on em.

As nature would have it that's pretty much the way they need to be harvested anyway because after collecting them you need to let them dry out and cure for a bit before the inside meat sets up properly anyway. Usually a couple of months.




Before getting to the actual nut however you must remove the outside husk which starts out green and then turns black as it rots away. I know there are places that buy walnuts and have these machines that will remove the husks but I have never heard of a private citizen owning one.

My Grandfather loved to collect Walnuts, de-hull them and then crack em open all Winter. Usually he made me and my brother pick em up out of the yard then after they dried a bit more and cured he would run over them in his driveway using his old Corvair (he said the little car did a better job without ruining the nut inside). Later on he devised a contraption that amounted to a short section of pipe mounted through a 2x4 that allowed him to place the Walnut on the pipe opening and hit it with a mallet.  This drove the Walnut through the pipe and removed most of the hull as it went through. Sometimes it would get stuck so he had a dowel he would push it the rest of the way through with. The 2x4 he would just set up between two sawhorses and have a bucket under the pipe so the nut would fall into it. He would remove the hulls of a bucketful and then take em inside to crack open and remove the meat as he watched television.

My Grandmother would then use the nuts for baking and other stuff. Sometimes she would even grind up the nut meat into a type of flour and add to things she was making.

There are still a few oldtimers around here that harvest the nuts that way. In fact I give a bushel of them to my Dad's partner in crime each year for that very reason.

In interesting thing about Walnuts is that my Dad used to pick em up and sell them. Back in the 50's he got $10.00 for every 100 pounds of Walnuts (minus the hull which they removed when he turned em in). That's a lot of Walnuts let me tell you. I would estimate about half a pickup load with the hulls still on. These days you can still collect em up and sell them but the going rate is $14.00 per 100 pounds. I guess inflation doesn't effect the labor part of the Walnut market.




You can see why I don't bother to collect Walnuts up to sell although a few people around here still do. I collect em up right now only to get them out of my yard. Currently I only have one small Walnut tree in the yard to deal with. The top picture was last year's collection and the bottom picture is this year's. If the nut production keeps growing at the rate it is in a few years I will have to come up with a better plan that just picking em up by hand.

Then again if things keep slowly declining the way they are I might end up being one of those oldtimers sitting around cracking Walnuts all Winter. That is after the beans are taken care of.

Maybe I should make one of those de-hulling things like Gramps had?

Keep Prepping Everyone!!!!


18 comments:

  1. Protein and fat in a shell. Well worth the effort.

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    1. K - Yes I think it would be when your on your own. Even when you are not but the time it takes is daunting. Then again when ya got nothing else to do but huddle down in the Winter it would really pay off.

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  2. All that you need to get the husks off is one of those old corn sheller machines, the old crank ones that separate the corn from the cobs with a couple big gears that spin the ear as it goes through. They will spin the husk right off of the nuts but it gets the sheller filthy so don't expect to use it for corn until you hose it out good. I just use mine for corn now but have used it for nuts years ago. You would be amazed, though too bad it doesn't crack the nuts and spit the meat out into a bag.

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    1. Sf - I have read that myself but honstly I don't think I have ever seen a corn shelling machine. I need to research that one. Perhaps if you could post a pic to your blog? :)

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  3. They would be a treat in certain circumstances, say we had no really world, lol

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    1. LW - Oh I am sure when the full decline hits us here I will be shelling em myself one day.

      Every little bit helps.

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  4. I read somewhere that in France a fully productive walnut tree used to rent for the same as an acre of land. Maybe if you get enough you could make your own walnut oil - great for cooking with, salad dressings and treating furniture with. i remember trying to take the husk off some once and it staining my hands yellow for a good two weeks!

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    1. Kev - Well I only have two little trees right here at the house. However if I really wanted Walnuts I could go pick em up by the truckload down in the woods. That might upset the squirrel population numbers though.

      And Ya my hands were stained just picking up the few I had in the yard. I finally went and got some old gloves.

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  5. Well, my comment disappeared when I pushed "Preview". I'll try one more time & go straight to "Publish".

    Walnuts??? I've been blessed (?) with several acres & probably 15 producing walnut trees. Yes, they can put the hurts on ya when they fall from 30-40 feet & they're great for sprained ankles.

    There's a lot of walnut info out there --- some good; some not so good.

    One university actually suggests that you get a large ladder & "harvest" the nuts before the squirrels get them. If you're inclined to follow that advice, you're probably too stupid to be climbing a large ladder. :o)

    Best advice I've seen --- If you happen to have or have access to a small cement mixer, toss a bushel or so into it & let it run for 10-15 minutes. AMAZING!!! It turns those nasty green hulls to mush & totally removes them.

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    1. Sorry about that Anon. I have noticed Sundays and Mondays are the absolute worst for doing anything on blogger. 9 times out of 10 my Sunday posts don't update for hours and the reply sections always lag bad.

      That's some neat info about the mixer. I actually have and old electric cement mixer my Great Grandfather purchased back in the 1940's and I recently got back into running order. Maybe someday I will give your experience a try myself. Lord knows we got all the Walnut trees around here we could ever want.

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  6. It's too bad that I really, really dislike the taste of black walnuts as we have them EVERYwhere around here. There are always people (usually those in the subdivisions) begging others to come get them and there are usually people happy to do so.

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    1. Carolyn - Well in a collapse situation they maybe well worth collecting nonetheless. If I remember right when my Grandmother ground em up and added them to her baking they didn't really have a Walnut taste per se or at least it wasn't dominate.

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    2. Just put them in the driveway and drive over them for a couple of weeks. Used to go every fall with my Dad, loved it.

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    3. Brian - Yes my Grandfather used to do it that way but what if fuel is scarce?

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  7. Those are falling all in my goat pen. I feel sorry for the goats but they have strong heads :)
    A lady in my community raked hers up and offered them for free to whoever came and got them. I was surprised at how many people took her up on that offer.

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    1. Kelly - I actually know of some people who still sell em. To me the money wouldn't be worth the effort but might be more payoff than aluminum cans.

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  8. I am like you. I have a few walnuts that land in our yard, but not enough to invest lots of time and effort in.

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  9. We have several trees, including one ten feet from the house. It takes three of us to put our arms around the trunk. And it drops those darn grenades on the roof over my bedroom all night long, every time the wind blows. Sometimes I collect them and drive over them - which is the easy part. The hard part is actual shelling. I've broken a variety of shellers that way. I think a hammer might just be easier.

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