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This column-initiated
in the March 2001 issue of Q. In these days of a revival
of herbal medicine, what can you tell me A. Acorns (Quercus species)- Acorns were used by the Iroquois
for treating burns. They crushed and boiled them and used the water
which contains tannin. Others used boiled dried bark Black walnut (Juglans nigra) and Persian walnut (Juglans regia)- Herb tea. Soak five Persian walnut husks over night and then boil for 20 minutes. Take 3 cups a day for heart disease. May be sweetened with honey. Mouthwash and preventive of cavities. Pound fresh bark and add 1 quart of boiling water. Simmer for 15 minutes. Add handful of finely cut leaves, cover, and steep for 50 minutes. Strain and store in refrigerator. Gargle and flush teeth with a cup of this mixture after meals. Warts, age spots, ring worm, and many other skin blemishes. Make a couple incisions in a green black walnut and rub the juice on the areas to be removed. Fungal infections. With boiled cabbage juice which has been strained, extract the juglone from the pericarp or ripened walnut husk. Re-boil 1 quart of the juice, add broken and bruised pericarp from 8 unripe walnuts. Simmer 15 minutes. Steep an additional 25 minutes. Strain and refrigerate. Take 3 cups daily between meals. Kidney or gall stones. To dissolve kidney or gall stone, deep-fry 2 1/4 black walnut meats in pure olive oil until crisp. Grind the meats to a course powder and mix with 2 1/4 tablespoons of dark honey. The paste is taken over 2 to 3 days. To dry up breast milk. Add 3 tablespoons of fresh cut walnut leaves
and 1 tablespoon of chopped green hulls. Steep 1 hour. Drink 2 cups
a day. (Source: Ray Curanzy Brazil nuts Brazil nuts contain a variety of amino acids both essential and non-essential along with high amounts of vitamins A, B complex, and C. They were used as a brain food. Butternuts (Juglans cinera)- Joseph Smith Jr., the American prophet of the Latter Day Saints recommended 2 tablespoons of ground butternut with a pinch of sea salt and stirred into hot oatmeal was great for stubborn constipation or intestinal parasites. Chestnuts (Castanea species) - Roasted chestnuts were used by the Pennsylvania Dutch for bleeding ulcers. The Dunkards of this area ground roasted chestnuts then mixed two tablespoons of the meal in a wooden bowl with 1 tablespoon of dark honey and 2 tablespoons of pure maple syrup. These ingredients were stirred with a wooden ladle but served on a metal spoon. Filberts (Corylus avellana)- They were chewed to sweeten the breath. Dried and crushed into a powder, they were sprinkled on top of a little peanut butter and applied to a throbbing toothache. Hickory (Ovata species)- Some of the early settlers learned this from the Cayuga Indians. Crush the meats of hickory, walnut, butternut, and chestnut and slowly boil them in water making sure to skim off the oil which floats to the surface. Save the oil. The oil was boiled again by itself, lightly seasoned with a pinch of salt. This condiment was used with bread, potatoes, pumpkin, squash, buffalo jerky, roast venison, etc. After skimming off the oil, the nut meats were mixed with mashed potatoes or else added to cornmeal making what sounds like a great bread. Pecans (Carya illinoensis)- This is an old remedy for headache-and yet not so old-from Waycross, Georgia. In a blender make a thick pecan nut puree with water. Spread the puree on two squares of gauze and apply to the temples while reclining. Pine nuts (Pinus pinon)- Pine nuts are sweet flavored,
high protein nuts used by Mediterranean people to flavor and compliment
foods. To use as a cosmetic the thin shell is removed and the kernel
is made in to a very oily meal which is mixed with goat's milk and
applied to the face, neck, and forehead at night. (Source: Ray Curanzy)
A. Many nuts have high food value. Some are high in oils and get rancid so they must be stored properly. As your teacher told you, fats are the highest calories in foods. For example, the cashew belongs to the poison ivy family and is very dangerous until roasted. It has a high oil content. There are a lot of nuts used around the world that we do not commercialize. The ones that we do are almond, black walnut, butternut, coconut, hazelnut (also called filbert), hickory, macadamia, pecan, Persian (also called Carpathian or English) walnut, pine nut, and some lesser known ones. The Brazil nut is taken almost exclusively from wild trees. The peanut is a bean. Acorns were used by Indians as an important food source. Today we feed them to animals as they have a high starch content. I wonder why the back-to-natural-food people don't pick up on this. The same goes for the beechnut. Q. What is a pine nut? A. There are basically two types of pine nuts in the US that
are harvest for eating: hard shells and soft shells. These should
not be confused with the Italian pignoli, pignola, or pignolia from
the European stone pine or the Chinese pine nut from Asia. Hard shells-commonly
called pinyon nuts-are found mainly in Arizona, Colorado New Mexico,
and Utah. This is probably the more popular of the two as far as the
US goes. Its obvious characteristic is that the shells are hard. You
will probably need to use a nutcracker or hammer to crack them. The
life span of this type of nut is a few years. They don't go bad very
fast unless they are stored improperly. Soft shells-commonly called
the Nevada soft shell pine nuts-are found mainly in Nevada and on
the borders of the surrounding states. Soft shells can be cracked
your teeth or your fingers. Because of the soft shell, it also has
an expected life of about three to six months. It is classified as
produce in grocery stores that sell them. Pinyon nuts come from Pinus
edulis, a short needled pine (2"), two to a bundle. It produces
most of the nuts consumed by humans. Pinus monophylla, a single
needle pine is a minor source. Pinus cembroides, the Mexican pinyon
has tow to three needles to the bundle.? An early (circa 1500) explorer
Cabiza de Baca noted the small pine trees whose nuts he considered
better than those in Spain. The thin husks were beaten while green,
made into balls, and eaten. The dry nuts were pounded in the husks
and used as flour. (Source: Ray Curanzy
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