One of today’s finds was a young bit of scotch pine that had recently fallen to the ground. So into the foraging basket it went to be taken home.
Although there are many edible parts of the scots pine, I decided to focus on the needles as it is still to early for the pollen and I could not reach any of the young cones.
I decided to make a simple pine syrup with the needles and start adding that to everything to counteract my wood avens obsession.
For the pine needle syrup you only need
- 1 cup pine needles
- 250 ml water
- 100 g sugar
Add the pine needles to cold water and heat up slowly, leaving time for the essential oils to be absorbed by the water. You dont want to overboil it and let all those aromatics just disperse in the air. Boil it for 10 mins or so on low heat and then add needles and liquid in a jar and leave in a dark place for 2 weeks.
The syrup can now be poured over pancakes, used to flavor drinks. Once the liquid is finished the needles can be dried and chopped up to make a sweet forest-y rub for chicken.
(Fer)mental Greens 