Video: 2010-11-18 - Indian Baskets and Acorn Grinding with April Moore (37 minutes)

Full Transcript of the Video:

We were gonna introduce you. . . [ Move to the Right ] >> Hi [inaudible] >> Greetings, I'm John Hak Silence. I'm the president of the Nevada County Historical Society. Welcome to tonight. So you all got your snow shovel? In you go. We're not meeting maybe on Sunday night right? So, happy new year. You're wondering why in the heck am I saying that in November? It's because we don't meet in December. And so happy new year in December. So remember, no stupid night in December. But we will resume in January. And Carolyn's gonna tell you all about that. So thank you for joining us tonight. She has a couple thank yous, including the senator talk about our refreshments and everything. So good. Good luck. >> Okay. So again, thanks for coming tonight. I'm very excited to have April here tonight. I've known April since I first started teaching in my current district, like. Long time ago. So we do want to announce that we got a new camera. And this will be the first speaker tonight recorded. So. We want to thank Larry, Hannah, and Gay Connors for bringing refreshments. And Wally Huggins and Kristy Teague and the primitive craft store for the raffle. And if you haven't bought tickets yet, you can do that. And we draw, we'll have April at the end draw the winning ticket. And there will be no speaker's night in December. But in January, it will be Alan Rodgers. And he's gonna talk about the history of the Odd Fellows Hall in Nevada City. And he's going to do a little presentation as if he were Aaron Sargent. And I was wondering, out of the folks that are here now, are any of you anticipating to come to the field trip on Saturday? Okay. A few of you. All right. So if you need to have directions to the Odd Fellows Hall catch me sometime, we are going to actually process some Black Oak Acorns at the Odd Fellows Hall from noon to 2. Okay. So I don't want to take April's time. >> Does this look like a railroad museum promo? >> No. >> You're right. It is. >> Speaking of railroad museums, Mr. Aldinton has an announcement. >> Well, yes. So we are having on the first Saturday of December our Christmas at the railroad museum in this year. It's an all day affair. Santa's going to be there all day. We've refreshed this door for sale at auction. Give shop, bring your camera. It's primarily for the youngsters, but most of us are well- >> Okay. >> We probably get more grandmas and grandmas with our kids sometimes and parents. But nonetheless, it's always a big day. And so we hope that maybe we'll see something in the end if you're young. And I'll just put this on the back here in case anyone has a question. >> Okay. So this is April. She's from an indigenous person here from the Nisnan Kankok and Washoe Tribe. And she's a consultant. She works with various companies when they do, when they're excavating. She's an expert on, she can excavate. I better than I can. But she and her brother have started a website called my2familystory. com, which I went to and read some. So if you want to check out her website, she and her brother have created that. And she's going to be talking tonight about how the local native people process acorns. So yay for April. >> Okay. Thank you. [ Applause ] We're going to start with this video. And it's going to pretty much explain a lot of acorn processing. I brought the materials that I use when I process acorn. And when I'm all done, I brought acorn mush for you to sample. This video was taken in October of 1958. It's Lizzie Enos and let's see who she is. >> You ready? >> Yes. It's Marie Potts. That's, at this point they're, they've already gathered acorn. They're cracking and taking the shells off the acorn itself. >> Can the picture be adjusted or is that just the way it is? >> I think that's the way it is. >> It's the way it is. This was originally a film. >> Oh, okay. >> As you can see where the lady over here on our, on your left side, that's Lizzie Enos. I have some material here how I crack acorns. She's shelled all the acorns and now she's trying to get that membrane that's inside the acorn that covers the acorn meat itself or the acorn nut. And this process is a winnowing process that she just did and that also you flip the acorns up and that membrane will fly off as the wind's blowing also. Here she's up what we call pounding the acorn itself. This is, if you're not used to this you'll end up stiff. Your neck and your upper arms will be really sore but these ladies were so strong that Lizzie's pestle is kind of a regular size and Louis Kelly's wife Londa used to have bigger ones about this big and she'd have two in each hand and she'd go like this into the hole because you're pounding them and you want to get it done quick. So those ladies were very strong. Yes it is. This is in her backyard. Over a clipper gap off Bancroft Road. That mortar still is in her backyard. Now you see she's moved up to a bigger rock, a longer pestle. The bedrock mortars that you normally see that are several cups in a large boulder, you'll notice the depth of each cup. Some of them are really deep and so they take pestles that could be a foot long. It took me 35 minutes to do enough for this bowl. You pretty much know how much you're going to need. [ Inaudible Remark ] Yes they do. If you pick an acorn right now because it's been raining, you want to take it in and let them dry and then you crack them and then you let them dry again and then you do that process where you saw Lizzie taking the outside membrane off it. It's like a piece of tissue paper on there and then you let the acorns dry again and then you go to the grinding process. Otherwise they're so moist and oily it'll stick to your pestle and the inside of your mortar. This is the traditional way of leaching acorn. Here they're down by the Bear River here, Lizzie and Marie and pre-cloth they just put the meal on a thick bed of pine needles. There is a large loss of meal but, you know, as you filter through your bed of pine needles could have been up to a foot deep. They would have just picked it out from in between and what you lose, you lose. Obviously this is an old film so. This is filmed by Sam Barrett for Norm Wilson. Anybody that has seen the Smithsonian Volume 8, you'll recognize some of the attire these ladies are wearing. They were taking still photos at the same time and two of these were used in that Volume 8 for the Nissenon section. This is one of those stills that was taken. It took me three hours. I take a hose and let it drip and stir it a lot. You want to stir it. It is very bitter if you don't leach it. Plus there's a lot of tannic acid. It will upset your stomach if you don't. And as you're leaching you're testing it. You just stick your finger in and lick it. Lick your finger to see if it's to your taste how you would like it. >> Is there a particular acorn that-- >> Black oak. >> Black oak. >> That's the only one that you use? >> That's the only-- well, the-- yeah, the only ones I use. In historic and prehistoric periods, each person would have had at least 200 pounds of acorns stored away for their winter and spring usage until the following fall when you can regather acorns. So in other words, 200 pounds a person per year is what you would have had. >> Are other oak trees acorns edible? >> They are but they're not as good as the black oak. The next best acorn is the blue oak. And up here it's hard to find the blue oak. You would have had to gone down to the lower foothills into the valley. Now this is-- you see photos of acorn being cooked in a basket. So I really thought this was very interesting to see it-- see someone actually doing it. You have to move very quickly with your paddle in that basket and your loop stick pulling out the cooled off rock back into the fire and getting another rock and cleaning it off and usually rinse it in a basket of water and then putting it in the basket. You can't let the rock stay in those baskets because it will burn the basket. And it cooks really quick. A small amount of acorn after it's been leached will almost three times its volume when it's-- when you add water to it and cook. She's cleaning off the rock. She didn't want to lose her acorn. She's sticking in another basket. >> Do acorns have a high school keys? >> They don't have a real high but they're good in protein but they also have a lot of vitamins and minerals and a lot of fat. But it's like the omegas out of fish. This is her demonstrating how to cut deer. You can turn it off now. Unless you want to see how she does deer. [ Laughter ] >> Yes. Ashley, she didn't smoke a lot of it. She dried it. So she jerky to her deer meat. And as a child and growing up, her house wasn't very big. It was a small little cabin. She'd have string across her house on the inside and she'd drape her meat across that. And she had a little wood stove she cooked on and heated with. So it was naturally dry. >> Did she have to do anything else to do it or she just laid it up there to dry? >> Just laid it up there to dry. >> What area did she live in? >> Clipper Gap, Christian Valley area. >> Oh, okay. No salt? >> Salt was used very sparingly. When I was a little girl and a child, we weren't allowed to touch salt or sugar or condiments period. The adults were our supervisors. They would watch us, give us permission to use it or they would use it for us. It's just a traditional thing where kids, you know, could overuse but salt was a very prized commodity. It was traded for a lot of very valuable products throughout other, the valley and the foothills and other groups around the Central Valley and foothills. And the Nissenland happened to have a large salt. It's not a mine but it was a salt area in Lincoln. And they had men for the Nissenland people control that salt so when they would go down and gather salt, you had to have kind of like your mayor go with you, you know, of your group. And then everything was organized and you took only what you thought you were able to use and it was used very sparingly. [ Inaudible ] About three, four days. It really doesn't take that long especially this is the time of the year you would be jerking it. Deer season just ended. Of course we didn't worry about deer season. You knew when to shoot them and when not to get them. But in a warm area, even if you were in your who, which is your house, you would string it up and it would dry just from the natural heat from the fire. >> Do you know what bears ever went in? To eat the meat? >> No. No. No, they kept bears away. So I think it's done. Yeah. I really enjoy this video because it really is pretty self-explanatory even though it has no volume or any language to it. It gives everybody a real good idea how the acorn was cooked in the basket because you can't find that everywhere. >> Just pop it in the pot. >> Yeah. [ Inaudible ] Just pop it out. When you go to gather your acorn, you want to start in the fall. The first group of acorns that start falling in the latter part of August and early to mid-September are usually the calls. It's the ones that aren't going to make it, that aren't inferior to all the other acorns. And then about the end of September through all of October and I just, I can still collect right now because the weather's been really good, is when you want to gather. And when you're gathering, you look for the acorn. It's got the black oak. Well, I got a half one here. It looks kind of like this and you want to check it out as you're picking. They have, if you see a little black spot or a hole, it's got a worm in it. You know, a lot of times the worm isn't so bad if he's just living in there. But in many times, the worm is in there and he's eating the inside out of the acorn. And all you'll have is a fat worm. But otherwise, if it's just a little worm, you know, you grind it up with the rest of the meal. It's no big deal. But this is the perfect time. I've been gathering our acorns just last month and a half and I store it away during the wintertime and I'm using last year's acorns now because I want them to dry out. And just like you saw on the video, I'll take mine and crack them and then I'll clean, crack a bunch of them and then I'll clean them out and then I'll let them dry again. And this is what I was talking about. You see the color on this particular acorn. It's kind of a reddish brown. That's the outside membrane. And what I want to do is when this dries again is I want to take my little basket here. This is kind of like my sifting basket. And I'll shake this and tell all of those, if you can see, the outside membrane there is dry now. So it makes it easier to clean it. Lizzie took it by hand and rubbed them like this. You can do that too if you don't have a little sifting basket. Just take them and I hope you can see and just rub them like that and drop them and it'll come off on your hands too. Once you get the membranes cleaned off of them, your acorns are going to kind of look like this. You can come up when we're done and look at everything. And they'll be clean and from there I go and let them dry again. I want to make sure they're nice and brittle because if I go to grind the acorn and they're not really dry, as I said before, they'll be real oily and it'll stick to your pestle and on your bowl. Not everybody has a bowl. Some people just use a flat rock. But I have a reputation around the community for people taking things. And they repatriate a lot of these artifacts back to me because they know where they belong. And this is actually a piece that came from Oroville. A couple people had it and they had a big guilty attack and they brought it to me. Most everything in this poster board over here either is a permanent fixture, which is a bedrock mortar. And when you see one of those, you know that's a habitation site. And when you have a lot of holes in this particular rock, there had to be a lot of people. Because if the holes get really deep, they've been used for a long, long time. When you see the bowls like this, my other photos there, those are more portable. All of those loose pieces over there have been repatriated back to me, which they're going to go back to their original places. The one bowl in the middle top, I like it well and I used it to grind my acorn. It's deep and it's so smooth inside, but it's deep enough so when I'm pounding my acorn with my pestle or my bah, nisinon, that means my pestle, my acorns don't pop back up at me. But I don't use a whole bunch of acorns. I use a small handful and crush them down until I get it really fine and then add another one that goes way faster than trying to do a great big handful and you'll end up with a material like this where you got a lot of grain and fine mixed in. So you just do it slowly. Like I said, for this particular amount I cooked here, it was just about a cup that I used to cook this so I knew how much I needed. Once you do this enough times, you know your measurements and how much you need to process for yourself. This, you can see I use this bowl also in my processing. They're heavy so when I'm doing it I have to sit really low and I usually sit on the curb on my patio and hold that with my feet and pound into it like this. Otherwise it rocks. The bowl I like at the top middle there that has the groove which is very unusual bowl. It's made out of granite, very smooth and it's about this tall and it's nice and deep so it works really well. The bottom of it has a groove in it. When I first got it we were sure what the groove meant. My husband said, "Well, you're probably putting it on a stick or a ledge so it doesn't rock. " Well, it's actually an arrow straightener. It's a multi-use bowl but it also when you're sitting on the ground and you're pounding in it, I don't have to hold it with my feet. It actually sits still with that groove in it. So it really works well. But once I get my acorn down finely ground, I go to my last phase and I cheat. I can actually get it really fine in here but it takes a lot longer. I just use an antique meat grinder and I get it so tight that it's really hard to crank and I only have to do it once because as long as I get that flour pretty fine then when I go through that meat grinder for the last phase and it is hard to turn, I got to tell you it is hard to turn. You know, when you're always asking for something, you know, you do it to yourself. One of the things that has been lost and I'm hoping to encourage again for the young kids is to create their own songs. Women used to sing while they were pounding acorn and they would make their own songs while they were grinding acorn. And what I was told is that you could hear different songs while different people were grinding. But they, you know, you got to do something. Some people talk and visited but a lot of the women just sang and made up songs as they were grinding their acorns. Yes? >> About the drying, do you have the separation? Do you put them all in one, like, break while they dry? >> Yeah, I just put them, yeah. I have what do you call a case for a soda or whatever, you know, aluminum drinks. It's about that deep. I just keep it by my wood stove. And then I leave my acorns there for a week, especially when you're gathering them right now because the ground's wet and it's rained on them. You want to dry it. Otherwise, they'll get rotten inside if you don't dry them and just leave them someplace where it's cool. They'll get rotten and moldy. Yes? >> Have you ever been up to the, it's up the highway towards Little County, Washington, where they have that big lookout and places that you pull over and they have little plaques. And I just noticed myself about a month ago that they have the geography of the area at each mountain name. And I have no clue that you can see the San Juan Richmond there. But the reason I'm bringing this up is because they have the history, the cultural history of the Meconon Indians and the population of them and how long they were in this country and, you know, in this. No, I haven't, but I've heard about it. >> It's very interesting. I can't quote me. >> And they do the same thing down at Bear Valley, but their information is poor. I made a comment to PG&E, you need to update your information. This is pretty lacking, you know. Kids know more than your kiosk. Yes? >> Were any of the bedrock, did any of the bedrock mortars have any other functions of the ground that you used to fix the food? >> You could use seeds, all kinds of seeds in them, yeah. Some, there's another milling rock, I guess is an easy term. They use, they were flat. And they barely had a dent in them. And those were used for like, some people call these big pestles that look like this. They're longer, but they're smooth on these sides here. They would do this, to mill seeds on these milling slicks. So you have, it's just not the ones with the holes, you have ones that are flat. And if you're walking anywhere up in the Sierras, I'd say, I'm going to say this and I'm going to probably find one below it. Blue Canyon and above, you'll find a lot of milling slicks on the granite outcrops. They're real easy to see. They're different color, a lot of times they're lighter than the rock itself. Like I do, just go up and it'll be smooth as heck. You know, oop, I was at a place that had over 75 milling slicks. So how many people were there? And this was over the 7,000 foot elevation. So. >> What about those tiny little copules all grouped together? I know you've seen them. >> I know what you mean. There's several theories. First one, they're a game. Someone actually tried to make a game and they found these little beady rocks. And they are game balls. I have, someone gave me a bunch of these little rocks. Perfectly round. And they're game balls. So they went, somebody tried with these game balls. And if the copules are real shallow, they're about this big and they're maybe two millimeters deep, they roll those rocks up in there and try to catch them in the cups. They've won work but it was really hard to do so they figured it was some kind of a game of skill. But the others, a lot of times we find one or two in an area, either by milling slick or by bedrock mortar. And more people are coming to conclusion because it has been talked about very much that those were used for medicine. And herbs. So. Because they never got deep and they never got big. They were real small. Yes? [ Inaudible ] Yeah. Washoe people love acorn soup. We still do that. >> They don't have the right kind of oaks though. >> No. Actually, you know, there are black oaks in Washoe territory at the top of the, up around Kingvale. Soda Springs, Sand Ridge, up along that whole area, there are acorn trees or black oaks. They're not as prolific as we have here but they do have them up there. And up towards North San Juan, Forest Service and I were talking one day in, one of the archeologists was telling me that they come across this stand of black oak trees and they started looking at them and they realized they were, the stand was absolutely square. And it was an old stand so they realized that they had been planted intentionally. And they were just, it just took all that theory away that it just, they just came along and picked wherever. So. But they, you know, you do, we do. Everybody does it. You always plant an acorn. You know, people allow them to sprout up and you thin them out when they get too thick. Either good for firewood, they're good for, you know, food sources, good for houses. They're also good, the black oak is also real good for a loop stick. And a loop stick's about this long, it's about this big and you take a branch of the black oak and you take the, you clean off the bark and while it's still young and pliable you make a loop, cross it over like this, like that and tie it off and let it dry like that and that's what you use to pull the rocks out of your basket while you're cooking acorns. And it stirs at the same time. So, yes. >> When the lady was carrying the hot rock, you left the hot rock out of the fire. It looked like she rinsed in that and left it all over. >> Yes, you rinsed the ashes off. >> Well, just to get the ashes off. >> Just to get the ashes off and then she put it in the basket and kept stirring. >> Well, I thought maybe it was just ashes. But then you said later that she was turning the rocks off and then the hot rock was in there. >> Yeah, no, she didn't want to put the, if you put the rock with the acorn meal on it back in, it burns. You know, the acorn meal's cooking and burning. So you take as much off the meal and then rinse it off again in water and toss it back in the fire. You have several of those rocks. >> And she rinsed it off on the way to the-- >> Uh-huh. >> -- and then again the-- >> Yes. Yes. >> How long was the boat off? >> Let's see, about a week. I'm not doing it all day. It took me about 40 minutes to crack my acorns. And that was to get this container half full. And then my husband was watching football while I took the outside membrane off. So I was just keeping my own self-company by doing that. And it took me 35 minutes to grind it up in my bowl before I put it in my antique meat grinder to make it really fine. So it took me outside other than leaching, maybe two hours. The leaching took the longest. Yes. >> What would be the best way to store acorn flour? >> In your refrigerator. >> In the fridge. >> Uh-huh. I do these demonstrations for different organizations but a lot for the MyDoo Museum. So I keep all my demo containers in my refrigerator. I have an outside refrigerator. And I've had this about three years. As long as you keep it cool, it'll stay fresh. >> So you can put it in like a basement where it's really cold? >> Uh-huh. The only thing you can't really store for very long is the final product is the acorn, cooked acorn itself. Because it spoils easy. Yes. >> I have a question about the cooking method of the acorn itself. Feel it and cook it and eat it. I mean, it's not poisonous or? >> It can, it'll make you sick if you don't leach it. >> It will. >> Yes. It's got a lot of tannic acid in it. >> Okay. This question I was going to ask you because I live with an 8-year-old man who goes out fixing acorns up, brings it in and cooks them on the stove, and then asks me to add it into his food. And I said, "But you said that because we have sheep also in the set, he told me that the sheep eat the acorns and then it'll ruin their liver, the tannic acid. " And I said, "Well, isn't it going to ruin your liver?" >> Uh-huh. >> I thought you mentioned it. So how does it make you sick? I mean, other than doing something in the liver? Because your liver -- >> No, it just upsets your stomach and you know, it'll make you sick. You'll feel real bad. Yeah. Anything that's got tannic acid will. >> Okay. >> I don't -- it'll ruin everything, not only your liver. [ Laughter ] Yeah. Yes. >> How long would you let the cracked acorns, whole acorns, how long would you let them dry before you grind it up? >> I do it when I need it. >> Okay. So you just did a -- >> Mm-hmm. Like I said, I'm cracking last year's acorns that I gathered. This year, we've got them sitting by my wood stove. And I sit there in a big -- you know, like I said, in my little flat. It's about that deep until they feel right and they're not moist and they get warm. And then I'll put them in a bucket. And then if we have more, I'll put them by my stove. But I generally store them in a big bucket in my house. >> After they're cracked? >> Yeah. >> Okay. >> After they're cracked, you know, you can leave them stored anywhere as long as -- you got to be careful though. I had some stored up in my garage. And not that it's a bad thing. It just looks funky. It's that I had them cracked like this in little bags. And the acorn worms got to them. And you'll see the little fine fuzzies on them. So I was plucking. I thought it would be a good example to show you. See that little fine fluff? You know, they didn't mind them. If you got them cleaned off and they got in your processing, that was okay. The worms are all right. But, you know, you've got to be careful when you do store them. And they would store them in bins in the old days with a lot of cedar boughs all around it. You also can use bay leaves and wormwood. Anything that is a natural bug repellent. You can mix in with your acorns. Yes? >> Would a bug guy not ever use -- >> Yes. Yes. >> How is their nutrition going? >> They're toxic. They're toxic, but they did use them. My uncle was down last month. He was in Oregon and he was going to collect buckeye and take home and cook. They'll roast them until they're just mushy. They're overcooked, in other words. And then they squish them up and mush them up. And he said, "It's really good. Once you cook the heck out of it, you don't have to leech those. You just have to really cook them well. " And the old-timers used to take the buckeye and put them inside the charcoals or the embers and just leave them there and move them around and then let them sit until they were way well done, past done. Some people acquired that taste. I've never had buckeye, but he says it's delicious and I'll take his word for it. I'm going to have him make me some one day. Yes? [ Inaudible ] Keeping a lookout? You watched it, you know, because you had not only did you have the squirrels or the rats, but you had birds trying to steal stuff to woodpeckers. You had all kinds of critters that wanted to come and take it. So you did have to keep a lookout on your granary. [ Inaudible ] Yes? [ Inaudible ] Springs. [ Inaudible ] Okay. They a lot of places had springs. [ Inaudible ] And small streams. [ Inaudible ] Oh, she walked over. Someone took her over there for the video. [ Inaudible ] She had a spring in her yard. Yeah. [ Inaudible ] That whole ridge line has springs. That's what it was famous for. That's why the people moved over there off of Winchester and live on it because it's actually part of the Sierra Nevada. It's an unusual rock outcropping. It was an unusual rock outcropping, I should say. And it had a lot of springs. So when the people came in historically into the Medivista area, they accessed all those springs and had fruit ranches. And they had all these little ditches running all over that area feeding their ranches. So. Well, I think I need to quit. It's going on 8 o'clock. [ Applause ]