Quiz: Do you know how acorns sprout?

You know, we delightfully gather acorns during our stroll in autumn forest. Then, now in every spring, not many people bother about them, don’t we? Then, a question: do you know how acorns sprout? Many people draw a picture like this:

Weeeeeeeeeeell, the truth is like this:

They first sprout a root from the pointy end. While the new root tries to take a hold in the ground, the fatty meat of a nut works as baby milk for a seedling. At the end of the growing root in a nut, a small cotyledon is growing, which will eventually become the seed leaves. While the baby leaves are developing, the meat turns red in order to protect the toddler from ultraviolet light from spring sunshine. So, in early spring we can find successful acorns on ground like this.

Otherwise, the acorn-acorns in spring forests are dead. It’s the beginning of a race of “survival of the fittest” for babies to be a giant oak. Good luck!

Intermission: Cooking acorns

Now we are approaching to the season of acorns. So, in this post, I report my cooking adventure of acorns last year. Actually, I nurtured my ambition for eating acorns that can be found very easily in almost any forests of Yokohama. They looked so appetizing. My ambition grew year by year … 

There were several excavations of prehistoric settlements in Japanese archipelago where researchers found numerous evidences of our ancestors eating nuts, acorns inclusive. Meanwhile, some of my friends told me their mums warned not to cook or eat acorns since “They are bad for your memorizing skills!” Hmmmmmmmmmmm … are they a kind of tranquilizer? Another friend taught me eating acorns are quite common and traditional in Tohoku area of Japan and in Korean peninsula. The most traditional Korean recipe is dotorimuk (or tot'orimuk), i.e. acorn jelly, she said. Well, at least, they are edible, then. Last year, a book was published from Yamakei Library, titled “I’ll be a stone-age man!” written by Hideki Sekine (2014,ヤマケイ文庫「縄文人になる!縄文式生活技術教本」関根秀樹著). There, Sekine explains how to cook acorns. Хорошо! So, I followed his instructions at first …

1. I collected acorns.

I’ve been to the forest of 2014 Art Exhibition in the Forest of Yokohama, and collected acorns of sawtooth oaks for about 2kg. That forest had many other acorns as well, but I thought large acorns of sawtooth oaks were “cost effective.” It was INDEED so.

Sawtooth oaks

and beneath.
There was one of the installations for 2014 Exhibition,
“Wind Communicator”
by Katsuyuki Ishiyama and Takeshi Fududa.

2. I washed acorns.

At this stage, I discarded acorns with cracks and warm holes.

3. I soaked acorns in fresh water for 3 days.

I changed water in the morning and evening. I thought peeling the skin of acorns would be similar to peeling the skin of chest nuts. Some of those worms within the acorns came out and drowned. Amen.

Water became brownish, though transparent.

4. I peeled the skin of acorns, and soaked the skinned acorns in fresh water again for about 1 week.

What I learned: Acorns are very hard to skin. All of my fingers got blistered, and the scars remained until spring. In the process, I beheaded several worms hided within the nuts … Amen, amen. I changed water every morning and evening as before.

5. When the water became somehow less brownish, I crashed the acorns in the food processor, and soaked the acorn meals again for a week.

I several times strained the meal by cheese cloth, and returned them to the clean water. Up to this point, it was as written in the book. The water became somehow transparent in the morning after a week or so, but still brownish, which Sekine did not mention. So, I decided to take the matter in a different direction from the book.

The water was murky
immediately after soaking the acorn meal.

A week later

6. I decided to boil the acorn meals.

The acorn meals rendered lots of lye. So probably what I did was not that bad.

The pan was full of lye. 

7. When the pan reached to the boil, I removed it from the heat, and strained the acorn meals with cheese cloth. 

After letting it cool, I stored it in a Ziploc bag. 2kg acorns became 650 g acorn meal.

Immediately after heating

Acorn meal in a ziploc
(er, well, IKEA bag, really)

The acorn meal I made was probably too coarse for making dotorimuk; it did not settle. I mixed it with agar powder for the muk. The taste was … very light (or “no taste at all”). It was strange because the acorn meal itself remained somehow oily after boiling. It may be because of agar. I did not use all the acorn meal for dotorimuk. They kept well in the freezer, and I used the remaining meal for “Acorn Bread” later in winter. I substituted bananas with acorn meal for the standard recipe of banana bread. The bread had a distinctively nutty flavor, which was different from any other bread. Success!

But … reaching to this point, I found myself not being tempted to collect acorns to eat any more … I still had aching fingers with scars of blisters. I now know why many of our ancestors stopped eating acorns … we are impatient bunch. People in Tohoku and Korea are awesome!

Developing: Kawawa Citizen Forest 川和市民の森

I mentioned in my first post that there are 42 Citizen Forests in Yokohama. True, but 7 of them are not yet open for the public, as of September 2015. For the remaining 35 Forests, 7 of them have opened in the last 3 years. I.e. roughly 30% of the Yokohama Citizen Forests are VERY new. Kawawa Citizen Forest 川和市民の森 is one of those babies. It opened its “gate” in April 2014. As such, 4 ha Kawawa Forest does not have an official web-site or a link to the map. Though, it seems to me the Forest will be a part of a nice half-day walking destination within few years. It is developing.

Kawawa Citizen Forest is the only Citizen Forest in Tsuzuki Ward 都筑区 currently. It’s located near Kawawa Station of Yokohama Municipal Subway Green Line. We leave the station from the South Exit by going down the steps. Then, the forest is just over there, in less than 10 minutes’ walk from the station. From this direction, the Forest is beyond a farm land and a cemetery. There is a tombstone with the date of the 1860s. The village around here was relatively new. Tsuzuki Ward itself is full of new towns, including Kohoku New Town 港北ニュータウン, one of the mega-residential developments in metropolitan Tokyo, where young families are building their lives. On the other hand, the Ward has the largest agricultural population in Yokohama. So, it’s a bit strange that Kawawa Forest is the only Citizen Forest in Tsuzuki. Actually, Tsuzuki Ward is preparing for another Citizen Forest, Ikebe Citizen Forest 池辺市民の森, in the southwest of Kwawawa Forest. I suspect the City is waiting for Ikebe Forest to be ready before providing us official internet links and the like to Kawawa Forest. Although such things are new around Kawawa Forest, between Kawawa and Ikebe Forests, there is pre-historic remains that is called Kagahara Remains 加賀原遺跡 in Tsukidematsu Park 月出松公園 (in front of the Yokohama Lab of KYOCERA). According to the Board of Education of Yokohama, the remains could date back to 2500 BC. People are living in the area for millennia. When Ikebe Forest is open, a walk for Kawawa Forest, Tsukidematsu Park, and Ikebe Forest would be a fun. Things are developing now. 

Going down this steps from the Station,

then, the Kawawa Forest is over there on the right
 (when facing to the direction of
Tsuzuki Fureai no Oka Station of the Subway).

Vegetable fields and a cemetery in front of the Forest

Tsukidematsu Park.
Excavation was done in 1977,
and the remains are now returned underground.

So, at the moment, the only map of Kawawa Forest I can provide for you is this one.

Map of Kawawa Forest

As it’s a new Citizen Forest, everything in the forest is new, including small trees planted probably quite recently. The road is simple and gentle for our knees to walk. The Forest is a hill of 4 ha. At the top, there is an open place surrounded by bamboos and large sawtooth oaks. The top of the hill also has a picnic table. So the trekking road of Kawawa Forest is first climb up to the open space, and then go down to the foot of the hill. In the middle of the road on the side of the City Subway station, there is a wooden deck where in a fine day we can see Tanzawa Mountains and Mt. Fuji.

Up from the entrance, Kawawa Station side

Bamboos and oaks,
a typical combo in Kawawa Forest

Everything is new here.

Though, trees are high.

When I go there, Mt. Fuji was under the cloud.

At the top of the hill

Basically, Kawawa area is comprised of farm lands and residential areas so that the Forest itself is very quiet and calm. I found many sawtooth oaks and their green acorns in August. I guess, before the area provided lots of foods for animals, humans inclusive. Japanese before the Emperor family declared the dominance in the 5^th century ate lots of acorns, along with newly introduced rice … Have you heard that this summer City of Sagamihara, neighbor of Yokohama, had a problem of bears coming to town to feed themselves out of trash bins? 

If you find a problem in the Park, please make a contact with

Office for the Park Greeneries in the North 北部公園緑地事務所

Yokohama Municipal Government Creative Environment Policy Bureau 横浜市環境創造局

Phone: 045-311-2016 (I guess in Japanese only)

FAX: 045-316-8420 (I hope there is somebody who can read English …)