How do I pickle spruce tips?

[mkayahara]

OK, I know they're considered a delicacy, and their season is now, so how do I go about pickling spruce tips? I have an enormous spruce tree in front of my house, but I'm not sure what variety it is. Do they need to come from a particular type of spruce? What goes into the pickling liquid? Do I pour it over the spruce tips while it's hot, or do I cool it first?

[Darienne]

Just found your post and am, as the British would say, gob-smacked. Followed it up on Google and found Spruce Tips Ice Cream. As an enthusiastic ice cream maker, I've got to try this. We have at least 15 acres of reforested spruce on our farm. Who knew?

Thanks so much for starting this topic.

This is were I found it. Spruce Tips Recipes

Edited May 17, 2011 by Darienne (log)

[violetfox]

Seriously? I never heard of such a thing, but I'm literally running home to try it now, with tips from my 60' tree!

[Darienne]

Not so simple I found. We have hundreds of tall spruce trees and most of them have immature cones on them right now. Maybe they have tips up at the top...not near the bottom. However, I did find a number of small spruce trees at the edge of the forest, about 3 - 4 feet tall and they had the little tips referred to in the recipe. Next step to remove the paper tips and clean them (we live on a very, very dirty dirt road and these trees get a waft of blowing dirt with the passing of each car.) I ate one. Oh...I don't know. It was very...tangy? I'm up for the ice cream experiment anyway!

[Chris Amirault]

Matt, where do things stand? Inquiring minds want to know!

[mkayahara]

Uh... things are on hold for the moment. Hoping to get some time this weekend to harvest some tips, and then I'll play. If I can't get reliable information on pickling them, I'll probably just try a fresh preparation instead. For now, I'm just sitting on a bottle of spruce beer, and wondering whether and how I could use it in a cocktail... Would spruce + gin be overkill?

[skavoovie]

Wow, I've never heard of pickled spruce tips before - and this thread is hit #4 on google now, so I guess they're not that common. I'm trying to get more into foraging, so maybe I will try this.

If you haven't done anything with them before, the simplest option is spruce syrup. Simmer the tips for ~2 hours, sieve, add sugar to the liquid, boil into a syrup. (Or add pectin for a jelly.) I don't have proper ratios, but it is good as a sauce for desserts, including ice cream.

[mkayahara]

So I harvested a few spruce tips this weekend from the spruce tree in front of my house. Fewer than I might have liked, since I failed to take into account the fact that there aren't very many branches within reach of the ground. After removing the papery bits from their ends, rinsing them, and patting them dry, I put them in a mason jar and made up a brine with cider vinegar (10% salt, 3% sugar), which I poured over the tips while it was still lukewarm. They're sitting in the fridge now, and I'll give them a couple of weeks there. Will report back once I've tasted them.

[GlorifiedRice]

Im going out tomorrow ad picking a whole bunch. Ive always loved that scent, Im so happy I can eat it now too

[GlorifiedRice]

I could only get an 1/8th a cup of the real tips.

However I was able to pic a few very tender young "shoot tips" that are longer and unfurled.

Can I eat these? they are not woody at all