Hackberry-wild rice porridge

I posted about hackberries last month, and have continued to harvest more since then. It may well be the year of hackberries (for me at least) because a whole tree came down nearby in the Christmas blizzard, making the berries very accessible! I am loving my weekly treks to the fallen tree, winding my way through its downed branches to collect the tiny berries. I discovered that hackberries taste quite different from tree to tree; these ones are less sweet than the ones across the park, and are a little thinner (or have bigger seeds). I read that a traditional/indigenous way of eating hackberries is to mix fat, crushed hackberries, and ground corn to make a porridge. I tried a similar version using wild rice and butter, and it is officially My Favorite Way To Eat Hackberries.

I tried various ratios of wild rice flour to berries, and settled on the one below. The result is a right amount of crunch, creaminess, and sweet. It really is like cream of wheat (from the rice), but with some more texture. Yum. My mortar and pestle, which I'd been wanting for a long time and finally purchased so that I could grind up hackberries, is getting good use and seasoning from my exploits! *I find it is worth the extra minute or two to make sure you have really crushed all of the berries. It helps avoid too big a crunch from an un-ground seed.

Ingredients (Serves 1)

• 1/2 cup hackberries, ground to a paste in a mortar and pestle
• 2 T wild rice, ground in a coffee grinder (I tried mortar and pestle and it was a LONG road to get powder)
• good pinch of salt
• 1 1/4 cup water
• 1 T butter (salted is best!)
  

1. Put hackberry paste, salt and water in a small saucepan and bring to just boiling. Turn heat down and simmer for 3-5 minutes, stirring a few times. The water will reduce slightly, and a nice froth will form on top of the hackberries. This is my favorite step in this process, because the froth and the aroma of hackberry liquid smells so good to me. 

2. Add ground wild rice, and stir/whisk well. Simmer another 2-3 minutes, stirring often, until thick. I usually stir half of the butter into the simmering mixture, and serve with the remaining butter on top, but you could go all one way or the other if you like.

I find this ratio is just sweet enough as it is, or you could drizzle some maple syrup on top.