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Falling into Your Bucket by Jill Lightner photo by Lara Ferroni Foraging for food is often written about in the context of the hunt. In this context, one must go to a tremendous amount of trouble to procure wild food, whether it’s the secret mushroom patch accessible only by a 10-mile hike through biting flies or the freshwater fishing trip that depends on expensive equipment, complicated permits, good weather and a tremendous amount of pure, unreliable luck. Some people enjoy what they’ve gathered, caught or otherwise unearthed all the more after such effort and/or discomfort. For most of us, being damp, crabby and covered with bug bites does nothing to boost appreciation of anything at all. A little work is rewarding, but a lot of work is just…work. Obtaining huckleberries is the opposite of work. The coastal huckleberry has more names than any little wild thing needs: red huckleberry, low-land huckleberry, red whortleberry, red bilberry and Vaccinium parvifolium (if you know anyone who’s capable of remembering Latin botanical names). The plants have no thorns, no particular appeal to wasps or spiders, and are easily found growing out of rotting stumps in parks or in shady backyards. Spot a stand of cozy old conifers or a downed log, and you’re almost certain to find at least one coastal huckleberry bush. Small ones hide near salal bushes; older, larger ones can give the effect of a startlingly youthful hedge bursting from a nurse log. If you venture out to an undeveloped spot of Washington woods between the Western side of the Cascades and the Pacific Ocean, the scrubby huckleberry shrub is likely to be one of the most common sights. The leaves are about the size of a pinky fingernail, and depending on the amount of sun and heat in a given season, they range in color from a nearly olive green to a bright greenish yellow. In spots with a forest canopy, the bushes tend to be denser and more compact—convenient for picking—and while they’ll grow in full sun, they’ll get scraggly and taller than any berry bush has the right to be. (And, of course, the best berries will end up just out of reach.)
When the berries are ripe, from the end of July until early October, the bushes appear to have chicken pox. Ripe coastal huckleberries are clear, bright red, like a berry you’d warn children away from eating because anything so pretty must be poisonous. Expect a berry smaller, firmer and less sweet than any of your previous berry experiences. Because their natural flavor is puckery-tart, there is no chance that they’ll dissolve into sugary blandness. Even at their sweetest, they’re still more like nature’s Sour Patch Kids than a sugar cube. This lack of sugar doesn’t translate to any extra health benefit: Dr. Dan Barney, Professor of Horticulture at the University of Idaho Sandpoint Research and Education Center, says that red huckleberries have the lowest levels of antioxidants of any of our wild huckleberry/bilberry varieties. This counts as another point in their favor: They’re unlikely to become the newest miracle cure. Enjoy them simply because they taste good. Ripe berries pull off the branches with a very simple technique: Run one hand along a berry-laden branch while using your other hand to hold a bowl underneath that branch. The fragile stems pop right off. It’s as simple and satisfying as removing your shoes after a day at the office. Native coastal tribes had a slight variation this technique: They’d lay a mat on the ground, give the bush a good shake and gather the ends of the mat together to form a carrying bag. Either of these mass-picking techniques works fine, and you’ll want to make use of one or the other. Berries are quite small and grow individually all along the branches, so picking one by one consumes far more time than need be. The ones that aren’t quite ripe won’t be easily pulled or shaken off, so some berries will remain behind for birds, deer, bears and squirrels—all known to be dedicated huckleberry fans. For optimal ease of picking, it’s nice to have a few bushes in your own yard (or at least a yard you have legal access to—hi, Mom!). Dr. Barney says that the best way to grow your own is to either buy seedling starts (see sidebar for nurseries), or find a bush with berries you like and collect a few extra berries. You’ll need to carefully extract the seeds (he compares it to “panning for gold”), let them dry for a week and plant the seeds in a spot with good drainage, morning sunlight and shady afternoons. Don’t attempt to transplant a bush you come across in the forest: Not only is there a chance it’s flat-out illegal (depending on where it is), it’ll likely just kill the plant. As far as more traditional/indigenous methods of seed collecting go, Dr. Barney says, “The fruits do not have to go through the digestive tract of a bird or bear in order for the seeds to grow. If you enjoy collecting bear droppings and picking out the nearly microscopic huckleberry seeds, go for it. This researcher finds that particular activity highly overrated.” So after a lazy-as-possible afternoon helping berries fall into your bucket, what can you do with them? They freeze easily. Once they’ve been rinsed, simply lay them on a flat sheet, pop them in the freezer for an hour or so (they’re small and freeze quickly), and then move the frozen berries into a more permanent storage container. They can be used anywhere the flavor seems appropriate; perhaps a little sour for morning pancakes, but a great starting point for sauce to go with roast duck or quail. With either fresh or frozen berries, just add sugar to taste and enough heat to soften the skins; you’ll have a thick, chunky dessert sauce to spoon over pound cake. With a dab of whipped cream, you’ve got a variation on summer fruit shortcake. These berries don’t hide timidly behind a rich biscuit or heavy cream—they come shining through no matter what might get piled on. In a mixed berry dessert, they’re a nice contrast to the varying degrees of sugar-bomb summer berries. Best of all is turning the fruit into a thick, translucent, seedless jelly. Cooking and straining a couple pints of berries results in a juice so purely red it’s like a liquid jewel. Instead, heat it up, stir it together with sugar until it thickens and spoon into a plastic storage tub kept in the fridge or freezer, for spreading on crumpets or toast. Not quite effortless, but in the world of wild food, this is as lazy as it gets. Find recipes for both seedless jelly and chunky sauce on our recipe page.
Huckleberry Plants and Growing Tips:
Red Huckleberry Products
Jill Lightner edits Edible Seattle, loves to bake and writes the food blog locallygrowngirl.com.
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