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Award-winning chef, author and forager Alan Bergo. Food is all around you.

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Black Walnut-Maple Honey

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Black walnut maple honey sauce recipeI love old cookbooks. Recently For research on lamb and goat recipes for the farm I work with, I’ve been collecting old Scottish and Irish books, most from around the 1900’s, since I know they historically work with lots of lamb and small ruminants.
 
Aside from all of the great recipes like hotch potch I found, there’s been a few others that I knew would be keepers. Nut honey was one that caught my eye.
 
At first glance it wouldn’t look like much, a little sugar, an egg yolk, some ground almonds—definitely not honey. What it seems like to me, is that it was likely a sort of honey substitute, maybe one for when honey wasn’t available.
A recipe for Scottish nut honey

The original recipe, from A Taste of Scotland by Theodora Fitzgibbons.

 
The inclusion of egg here is a good trick—one that I usually only see with old mustards, the type of ones in small bottles with artisan labels that have been growing in popularity, for good reason.
 
Egg yolk, gently simmered in a mixture with sugar and vinegar thickens lightly, giving a sauce with a velvety, custard texture. Without the added egg yolk, you’d be left with a watery, sugary syrup that’s light in texture.
Black walnut maple honey sauce recipe
 
Having made plenty of stovetop mustard like I mentioned, I knew I could adjust the recipe to use maple syrup instead of sugar, as long as I reduced the maple syrup a bit to account for it’s additional water content.
 
In place of the almonds, I used my hand cracked black walnuts, and the finished product is really good.
 
Yogurt with black walnut maple honey, apples and black walnuts

The finished sauce is spoon-able straight from the fridge and would love to be drizzled over something tangy and creamy. Pictured with greek yogurt, black walnuts and apples.

 
The original recipe notes said that the nut honey was good for children as a tea time snack, but this one, a slightly thick, sweet, maple-walnut sauce, is a grown up version born to be spooned warm or cold onto all kinds of things.
 
I love it with creamy things like yogurt and ice cream, or tucked inside thin crepes with cream cheese. It’s a great recipe to try if you have a few nuts and some good maple syrup around.
Black walnut maple honey sauce recipe
Print Recipe
5 from 1 vote

Black Walnut Maple Honey

This has the consistency of honey infused with walnuts, it’s great anywhere you would use honey, as on yogurt, with cheese, on toast, etc. Makes a little over 1 cup
Prep Time5 mins
Cook Time20 mins
Course: Dessert, Snack
Cuisine: Scottish
Keyword: Black Walnuts, Maple
Servings: 4

Equipment

  • Small saucepan, Metal mixing bowl

Ingredients

  • 3/4 cup maple syrup (1/2 cup brown sugar can be substituted)
  • 1/4 cup (2 oz) orange juice
  • Zest of one orange
  • Zest of one lemon
  • 2 large egg yolks
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1/4 cup (2oz) dry white wine
  • 1 oz black walnuts lightly toasted and crushed
  • 1/2 oz unsalted butter

Instructions

  • Bring the maple syrup to a boil then turn down the heat and simmer for 5 minutes to reduce it by 1/3, then whisk with remaining ingredients. Don't worry about the butter, it will melt as the sauce cooks.
  • Put the mixture in a metal mixing bowl above (not touching) simmering water, and cook for 20 minutes, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until the mixture thickens and the egg has activated.
  • Cool, cover, and refrigerate.
  • If the sauce tightens in the fridge a bit, a splash of lemon juice will refresh it.

Notes

Other nuts can be substituted for the black walnuts, but the perfume of freshly cracked black walnuts it really nice here.

 

Related 

Guide to Black Walnuts 

 

Related

Previous Post: « Scallopini with Pickled Wild Mushrooms and Brown Butter
Next Post: The Forager’s Guide to Black Walnuts »

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Julia McCabe

    June 19, 2020 at 3:17 pm

    Am I missing something in the recipe? I don’t see how many black walnuts or when to add them to the syrup. Do you use 1oz, as in the original recipe? Also, can you tell me the volume of white wine to use? Thanks

    Reply
    • Alan Bergo

      June 19, 2020 at 3:55 pm

      Hey thanks, unfortunately I keep having problems with the recipe widget stripping things from source files. Everything’s adjusted there.

      Reply
      • Julia

        June 19, 2020 at 4:11 pm

        thanks so much for your quick reply!

        Reply

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FORAGER | CHEF®
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Alan Bergo
Long, fun day snatching crayfish out of the water Long, fun day snatching crayfish out of the water by hand with Sam Thayer and @danielvitalis for @wild.fed 

Daniel and Sam were the apex predators, but I got a few. 

Without a net catching crayfish by hand is definitely a wax-on wax-off sort of skill. Clears your mind. 

They’re going into gumbo with porcini, sausage and milkweed pods today. 

#crayfish #ninjareflexes #waxonwaxoff #normalthings #onset🎥🎬
Working all day on preps for cattail lateral rhizo Working all day on preps for cattail lateral rhizomes and blueberries for this weeks shoot with @wildfed 

Been a few years since I worked with these. Thankfully Sam Thayer dropped a couple off for me to work with. They’re tender, crisp and delicious. 

Sam mentioned their mild flavor and texture could be because they don’t have to worry about predators eating them, since they grow in the muck of cattail marshes. 

I think they could use a pet name. Pond tusk? Swamp spears? Help me out here. 😂

Nature makes the coolest things. 

#itcamefromthepond #cattail #rhizomes #foraging #typhalatifolia
I liked the staff meal I made for Mondays shoot so I liked the staff meal I made for Mondays shoot so much we filmed it instead of the original dish I’d planned. 

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Next up blewits. Spawn from @northsporemushrooms

#winecaps #strophariaaeruginosa #allthemushroomtags
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If you’re interested send me a message and I’ll raffle off the spots. Plenty of cherries to go around. I’ll be leading a short plant walk around the farm too. 

#chokecherries #foraging #prunusvirginiana #summervibes
Special thanks to the beach in Ashland for hooking Special thanks to the beach in Ashland for hooking it up with on-site garnishes. Beach pea flowers taste strong and leguminous, similar to vetch, or like a rich tasting pea shoot. 

#lathyrusjaponicus #beachpeas #peaflower #foraging #northshore #bts
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