Peace of Cake

Imagine spending more time driving and shopping for one food product than it takes to make a cake! I can’t remember ever in my life shopping for a sole ingredient.

I hankered for gingerbread cake, and what better excuse than the Women’s Resistance Choir performance and celebration potluck. I had all the ingredients I needed – molasses, plenty of powdered ginger and spicy homemade apple butter to sub in for oil. I figured the fruit spread would enhance the cake, where olive oil might render an off flavor. I had everything – but flour.

As we’re a peace-loving group of women who sing songs of joy and empowerment, I cut a peace sign stencil of parchment paper, lay it down on the cake and sprinkled powdered sugar through a metal strainer over the stencil as decoration. I quickly realized that it’s impossible to erase confectioner’s sugar, and that the image might distort in transit. Oops. Maybe the design wouldn’t melt or blow away. Perhaps a humid day wouldn’t be as forgiving.

Four months into my “Food Buying Moratorium” (when I decided to restrict meals to eating out of my pantry and chest freezer for as long as possible), I’ve had to adjust some of my rules. If I plan to share food with others, it’s okay to shop for an ingredient when it’s needed for a recipe.

Since January, I’ve been enjoying all sorts of homemade dishes and delicacies without needing to venture to the market. Alleluia! My preference is to be outside skiing, hiking, or biking. Anything but shop.

Although I’m starting to miss having food choice, an abundance of last year’s frozen greens, beans and pesto await consumption. Possibly my supplies will last through June. My friend, Loekie, suggested that it would sound much more impressive to survive half a year without buying food, , rather than five months.

We’ll see.

Fascicles, Sessiles and a Medicinal Dose of Power

“What are you collecting?” the gardener had inquired.

“You are going to laugh at me, but I am collecting lob-lolly pine pollen, the same messy yellow powder that everyone here in North Carolina has recently been complaining about covering their windshields, porches, decks and shoes.”

“Cool,” he replied, without missing a beat. “Want some company to get more?”

What are the chances of finding another person in my cousin Jeff’s co-housing community, who appreciates foraging for free medicinals?

Until this trip, I had never even heard of a Loblolly Pine, the second-most common species of tree in the United States, after red maple. The lanky “telephone pole tree” can stretch over 100 feet when mature. As they grow taller, the trees lose their lower branches. Locals refer to them as lolly pop trees.

Jeff had complained one too many times about the yellow powder’s prevalence, so I sarcastically interrupted his diatribe with, “Bet it’s good for something. I’ll go look.”

It turns out that the pollen can be helpful medicinally in many ways:

The pollen is chemically almost exactly identical to the male hormone testosterone and can be purchased in big bags over the internet as a testosterone supplement. Supposedly, Native American warriors would carry a small bag of this pollen with them to eat before battles to "pump them up.”

Lob-lolly pollen contains 18 amino acids, numerous vitamins, including D which is rare for plants, is full of minerals, and has beneficial enzymes. Some uses in Chinese medicine include: relieving fatigue and rheumatic pain, strengthening the immune system and heart, as well as increasing mental agility.

My new friend, Bern, and I managed to collect a quart each of cones, which I spread out on a paper bag on the counter until they had dried, opened and released their pollen. I ended up with a meager quarter cup of relatively flavorless, but powerful powder- 12 teaspoons, which I readily shared with Jeff before we headed out on the wooded trails on our mountain bikes. Did we fly! Hah!

Bern was going to save his scanty stash until early spring, next year, when he planned to take it preventatively as an antihistamine.

After learning that the needles are rich in Vitamin C (five times the amount found in a lemon), I collected a handful, over which I poured boiling water for a lemony -piney flavored tea.

Imagine what a resource is going to waste throughout the southeast! I imagined giant shop vacs attached to humungous bags, hanging from helicopters throughout the forests, collecting this nature’s powdery wonder.

***Lob-lolly has two or three needles per fascicle, which is a slender bundle (as of pine needles or nerve fibers). The cone is directly attached to the branch, which is called a sessile (a plant or animal structure attached directly by its base without a stalk or peduncle).