Ginko Nuts

I just bought some ginko nuts from Nijiya, a Japanese grocery store.

Ginko nuts (銀杏 = ぎんなん = “ginnan“) are a fall crop which I have seen in fall recipes for rice, etc. Should be good for Zen vegetarian cooking experiments!

Preparing ginko nuts:

  1. crack each nut with pliers
  2. boil for ten minutes
  3. the inner skin will fall off, leaving a light yellow kernel- this is the part you eat!
  4. eat with steamed rice

Results of the experiment: the nuts straight out of the shell are squishy! I tried cooking them with the shells totally removed, with the skin intact, with half a shell on, and with the cracked shell on- all cooked the same amount, but removing the boiled shell is more of a pain, so I recommend removing the shell completely before boiling.

The cooked nuts taste sort of halfway between a chestnut and a starchy corn kernel- very good! I had them over rice with some sliced myoga (茗荷 = みょうが), a kind of oniony thing with a gingery taste to it. A very flavorful snack with no fat or sugar or salt!

From Gingkoes Are Living Fossils by Marianne C. Ophardt:

Jack Hampton, Washington State University Master Gardener, was a nut and fruit enthusiast who passed away in 1999.  He was a local expert on nuts.

Hampton offers these tips on harvesting Ginkgo nuts, “Gather the ripe fruits using rubber gloves.  Squeeze out the seeds in a bucket of water, wash them thoroughly, and then dry them.  The result will look like a large unsplit pistachio nut.  They are not ready to eat at this point.  To prepare them for eating, first crack them with a pair of pliers.  Then boil them for about ten minutes.  The inner skin (called a pellicle) will fall off leaving a light yellow kernel.   It’s this kernel which you eat.  It tastes something like sweet corn.  You may keep these nuts in your refrigerator in plastic bags for a short time, but they  are highly perishable.”  Hampton noted that the “Chinese have long eaten these white nuts on special occasions, such as weddings and holidays.”    He also cautioned that those new to eating Ginkgo nuts observe caution with this new food.  Eat it only in small quantities until you have determined that you have no allergies to the nuts.

Definitive guide to Phreak Boxes

Traditionally, in the phreakers’ culture, any device thought to be connected to the phone line is called “box” and is named after a color since the first “Blue Box” invented by Captain Crunch, the father of the phreak scene. Since all colors were quickly used for this purpose, other fancyful names were also used to name boxes.

Web link of note: Definitive guide to Phreak Boxes
(At http://www.aboutphone.info/lib/phreak/boxes-2.html)

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