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Wood Parched Wild Rice, Black Walnuts, Wild Herbs and Green Garlic

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Wild Rice With Green Garlic, Black Walnuts, and Wild HerbsHere’s another one of my favorite dishes that I developed for the dinner at Piney Hill this year for Slow Food Minnesota’s “Where the Wild Things Are Dinner” which showcases local, wild ingredients. I knew we needed some sort of starch to help complete our meal, and for a whole bunch of people it needed to be quick to prepare on site, as well as interesting to eat.

Cultivated wild rice is a dime a dozen, and anybody can get that from a chain grocery store. The real deal though is wood parched wild rice, which is traditionally toasted in a basin with wood paddles, by hand. I’ve mentioned wood parched rice plenty of times on here, and If you’ve never had any, it will change the way you think of wild rice. It’s miles away from the dense black seeds you see at the grocery store, with a nutty flavor, gentle texture, and none of the mothball essence that large scale paddy wild rice can take on. It cooks fast too, in about 15 minutes.

Wood Parched Wild Rice

The goal of the dinner was to showcase wild Midwestern Ingredients, so I decked decked the rice out with hand shucked black walnuts, wild herbs and green garlic from Bubbling Springs Farm near Menomonie. I wanted the flavor to be strong, borderline aggresive. The flavor of black walnuts is just that, and I know plenty of people who don’t like them at all, but I crave their almost menthol-nut flavor.

Salt Cellar Team Prepping Green Garlic

Two trusted staff members of mine helping out. Sous Chef Matt Griffin (foreground) Jeremy Bechtold (beard).

The wild herbs needed to be strong too, which isn’t a problem. Monarda fistulosa (wild bergamot) is easily available, as is Glechoma hederacea (creeping charlie), and they both pack a savory herb punch. Both are also pretty much unknown for use in the kitchen from my experience too unless you’ve studied wild food a bit, which gave me even more reason to introduce them to people.

Foraged Herbs

Creeping Charlie (left) Monarda (right)

Lastly, the green garlic. It’s a great Spring ingredient if you’ve never had it, and I’ve mentioned it once or twice here. When garlic is young, the whole plant is tender like a scallion, and can be cooked similarly, just dig the whole shebang out of the ground. The flavor is a bit in between, more aggressive than scallion, but less potent than bulb garlic. I love sweating it with a little butter to spread the aroma to whatever I’m in the mood to eat.

Wild Rice With Green Garlic, Black Walnuts, and Wild Herbs

Wild Rice With Green Garlic, Black Walnuts, and Wild Herbs
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Wood Parched Wild Rice, Black Walnuts, Wild Herbs and Green Garlic

Yield: Serves 4-6 as a side dish
Prep Time30 mins
Cook Time45 mins
Course: Appetizer, Side Dish
Cuisine: American
Keyword: Bergamot, Black Walnuts, Creeping Charlie, Parched wild rice

Ingredients

  • 5 ounces wood parched wild rice roughly 1 cup
  • 3 ounces green garlic diced ¼ inch
  • 3 ounces black walnuts toasted
  • 2 tablespoons chopped wild bergamot
  • Roughly ¼ cup ground ivy leaves creeping charlie and flowers if available, washed, cleaned, and left whole
  • Kosher salt and pepper
  • 3 tablespoons unsalted butter
  • Sea salt and fresh ground black pepper

Instructions

  • Toast the walnuts at 300 for 15 minutes or until aromatic.
  • Let the walnuts cool for a few minutes, then rub lightly between two layers of a towel to remove the papery husk. Cook the wild rice in lightly salted water until cooked and tender, roughly 20 minutes, then drain and reserve.
  • Meanwhile, sweat the green garlic in the butter in a wide, deep pan, add the wild rice to the pan with the green garlic and butter, then add the walnuts, bergamot and ground ivy and toss to combine.
  • Double check the seasoning for salt and pepper, then serve immediately, garnished with the ground ivy leaves.

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  1. Dotty

    July 16, 2016 at 7:22 am

    Ah, blessed sacred Menomen is so deeply satisfying and nourishing on all levels. I get mine from
    White Earth reservation or as I find it in the North. I take it on camping canoe trips and cook a bunch the first meal then use it as breakfast with butter, nuts and our maple syrup ad as stir fry or base for a base for other meals. I add wild plants if I find them, and of course mushrooms are a natural mate. thanks for again making me dream and drool, dear Forager Chef. keep on Cooking.

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Some nice wild enoki clones from @unkle_fungus Can Some nice wild enoki clones from @unkle_fungus Cant wait until these start popping up when the snow melts. The difference between the coloration of wild ones (pic 1) and cultivated that are white from the lack of sun (pic 2) is always interesting to compare. (The cultivated ones are a different species of Flammulina too). 

We’re really lucky to have such a vibrant community of small, local mushroom growers and related makers. Feel free to tag your favorite you like or one I should know about in the comments. 

#enokimushroom #mushroomgrowers #flammulinavelutipes #blanche #allthemushroomtags #wintermushrooms
Celebrated my birthday last night with a few stiff Celebrated my birthday last night with a few stiff spruce’n’sodas. The spruce tip liquor I collaborated on with @ida_graves_distillery drinks like a mildly piney gin. Dangerously easy to drink. #sprucetips #craftliquor #drinkatree #itsmybirthdaybitches #im25again
Social media can be a wall-to-wall, endless string Social media can be a wall-to-wall, endless string of triumphs. We all know reality isn’t like that, so with the snow melting here, I thought I’d share a funny maple season fail with you (at the time it was not funny).

I was making maple soda out of sap, sweetfern and syrup that I like. I’d kept the glass bottle of soda in the fridge for a couple weeks, waiting for a good time to get to it. I’d started the mother batch with a pinch of commercial champagne yeast, which is vigorous stuff. 

One night I got up and poured myself a glass of water, and sleepily forgot to close the fridge all the way, which increased the temp. A few hours later I woke up to what sounded like a grenade going off. 

The bottle exploded and the inside of the fridge, all its contents, and the floor were covered with sticky maple juice, and I spent the next two hours mopping and picking out shards of glass that had embedded themselves like shrapnel in the walls of the fridge. 

Now, I use plastic restaurant cambros to make carbonated drinks. 💫

#fermentationfails #fail #soda #fermentation #explosions #dontrythisathome
My chief editorial assistant about to do backflips My chief editorial assistant about to do backflips for smoked goat kidneys. 

If you would have asked me a few years ago if I would see myself writing recipes (and filming videos) on making dog treats I would have laughed. 

But, working with @shepherdsongfarm, trying to figure out creative, economical methods for butchery and whole carcass utilization for lamb and goat has pushed my creativity into new places. Grateful for that. 💫

If you get down on kidneys, I have a good version for humans on my site too. A good piece of charcuterie to know. 

Hand model @pgerasimo 

#grassfed #goat #eatmoregoat #kidneys #offal #dogtreats #rescuepitbull #editorialassistant
7pm ET tonight on @the_outdoor_channel I take @dan 7pm ET tonight on @the_outdoor_channel I take @danielvitalis hunting for mushrooms and pigeons in WI, then I cook dinner on the farm for @wild.fed, his outdoors series that shows that wild food is much more than just meat. 

If you don’t have the outdoor channel, you could use the free trial of @frndlytv that will let you watch it live. 

Finished dishes I did were pigeon brochettes with rams bacon, sunflower roulades and wild cherry sauce and pigeon, sweet corn and wild mushroom stew. 

#mushroomhunting #wildfed #foragerchef #outdoorchannel #pigeon #foraging
After watching an old episode of Munchies (see You After watching an old episode of Munchies (see YouTube/Vice) I scribbled down a prep for yellow foot chanterelles a Swedish food truck was making. They took flatbread (tonnebrod, but I use lefse, because 🇳🇴💪) piled high with hot yellowfeet and fresh kraut, mayo, Västerbotten cheese (fontina or Hushållsost are ok subs). 

It’s one of the best ways I’ve had yellowfeet, like a funky, cheese, Nordic burrito. Just killer. 

I even forgot my lefse and served some to family in a couple BS flour tortillas Grandma had (heresy, IK) —still didn’t suck. 

Props to @ingebretsens in Mpls for making their own lefse since my Norwegian Grandma wasn’t  around. I channeled her though. 

#midwestwinter #lefse #lefseforlife #youbetcha #oleandlenawouldbeproud #yellowfootchanterelles #wildmushrooms
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