100 Mile Dinner: November 2014
This month we introduce some foraging into the mix: kousa dogwood fruit and acorn. These will be key ingredients for our dessert and drinks.
Kousa dogwood is a gorgeous tree, typically considered an ornamental, but the fruit has a slightly sweet pulp with creamy texture, and a taste that hints of plum. The fruit is best in October as it turns a dark red. It takes no time at all to collect a few kilograms.The fruit was placed in a pot with a little water and taken to a boil. Mash/smash the fruit up as best you can in this step.
It is then taken off the element and strained to remove the seeds. This step is somewhat tedious, but you get the hang of it after a while. From here you may substitute kousa into your favourite recipes, keeping in mind the kousa will have a low sugar content. This month we make a frozen kousa dogwood yoghurt by mixing yoghurt, honey and kousa dogwood fruit. Our mix combined 1/8th cup milk, 1/6th cup honey, 2 cups yoghurt and 1 cup of pureed dogwood fruit pulp.
Acorn is our second "exotic". We collected acorns from English oak. These were boiled for 15 minutes, and hand-shelled, discarding any darkened bits. The nuts were dried overnight in a dehydrator and then baked at 375 degrees for 15 minutes.
To make an acorn drink, grind up the result, and bake the acorn grinds for 10 minutes at 375 degrees. The toasted grinds can be placed in a coffee maker for 10 minutes or so. Delicious! 
The spent grinds should not be thrown away! Stir into water and place in the refrigerator, replacing the water twice daily for a week. This will leach out the tannins and the bitterness. Dehydrate, grind, and sift the result to yield a handsome, dark flour.
In addition to the "exotics" we introduced a few new items: chard (garden-fresh), figs, and Nanaimo-farmed Pacific Oysters.
Ingredients:
Pacific Oysters (Nanaimo)
Squash seeds, carrots (1), garlic, chard, rosemary, kohlrabi, chives, parsley and cucumbers (garden).
Kousa dogwood fruit, figs, acorn grounds and flour (from English oak). These were foraged from the city of Vancouver.
Birchwood cream, & yoghurt (Abbotsford).
Eggs (Maple Hill Farm - Abbotsford)
Macro Kelp (Bamfield)
Sifted Wheat Flour (True Grain Mill's Red Fife, Duncan)
Mushrooms (Richmond)
Tomatoes (Langley)
Onion (Stein Mountain Farms, Lytton)
Honey: (Valley Gold Bee co. honey, Richmond)
Sea salt (Vancouver Island Salt Company, Bamfield)
Drink: Toasted acorn drink (see above)
Appetizer: Fresh salad.
Slice carrot (raw), figs, cucumbers, squash seeds. Mix with yoghurt, and a pinch of salt.
Dinner:
Butter: According to the July Dinner instructions make butter from cream.Pasta sauce: Using butter, stir fry onion, kohlrabi, chard, garlic, chives, tomato, kelp, mushrooms, rosemary and salt.
Pasta: Mix 1/2 cup red fife flour, 1/4 cup acorn flour with an egg and knead until uniform. Make into pasta with pasta maker. Cook and add pasta sauce. Add parsley to garnish.
Dessert: Kousa dogwood frozen yoghurt, as described above.
Comments:
Pasta is a lovely, rich dark colour, although there was not much acorn expressed in the flavour. The toasted acorn drink is reminiscent of coffee. The longer you leave the hot water in contact with the grounds the more bitter the drink - perhaps 10 minutes is about right. The drink is nuttier than coffee and it is even more pleasant with a touch of cream. Kousa dogwood frozen yoghurt is peach-coloured and mildly sweet. A winner!
