Dec 16 2008
Hickory Nuts
Have you priced nuts in the stores lately? I cannot believe that pecans are $8 a pound or more. That’s shelled, of course, but even nuts in the shell are expensive.
My woods is full of hickory trees, among other species. The hickory trees are towering homes for squirrels, and the shagbarks provide roosts for the common brown bats, who devour thousands of insects each year. Brown bats have been maligned as carriers of rabies, but the incidence is no more than for other wild animals by most estimations. Anyway, I like to watch the acroBATics of these little guys on a summer evening as they dip and dive after mosquitoes (which are extremely dangerous carriers of West Nile Virus and other diseases that plague humans, not to mention heartworm in dogs.)
Back to the hickory nuts . . . I pick them up for free. Crack these open and you’ll find nutmeats very similar to pecans. In fact, I prefer hickory nuts to pecans. Use them instead of pecans in any recipe. I crack them and freeze the meats, keeping them fresh until the next fall. The nutmeats are a bit smaller and the shells are harder than pecans. It takes a bit of picking sometimes to get them out of the shells, but they’re worth it.
And it’s great finding free food.
Sigh. I used to gather hickory nuts–beautiful trees. And later, when I moved to N. Florida, my husband and I owned a house with several mature pecan trees in the yard. We not only had all the pecans we could use, year round, but we sold them to the packaging plant in our town. Pecans are my favorite nuts and I miss them. They’re way out of my league now.