This recipe calls for using juniper ash in place of baking powder. Wow!

#Navajo #BlueCornmeal Pancakes (Abe' Bee Neesmasi)

Servings 10 pancakes

Ingredients

1 cup flour
1 cup roasted blue cornmeal
2 tsp baking powder or juniper ash
2 tsp granulated sugar
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups milk
2 tsp cooking oil
Maple syrup or homemade jam for toppings optional

Instructions

- Whisk together flour, blue cornmeal, baking powder or juniper ash, sugar, and salt in large bowl.
- Add milk and stir.
- Heat pan or griddle to medium heat.
- Coat pan with cooking oil.
Use ladle to scoop approximately 1/4 cup of batter and pour into pan.
- Flip pancake when bubbles form on the top.
- Cook other side until golden brown.
- Serve plain (traditional) or with optional toppings.

Notes
Juniper Ash is a traditional ingredient used in cooking among the #Diné (Navajo) communities. Pancakes made with juniper ash will be denser and have a deeper purple color than those made with baking powder. Roasted blue corn and juniper ash are available through Navajo Agricultural Products Industry (#NAPI)."

Source:
https://tasteofmissions.com/navajo-blue-cornmeal-pancakes/

#SolarPunkSunday #TraditionalRecipes #PlantAsh #BlueCorn #CornRecipes #NavajoRecipes #DinehRecipes #TraditionalFood #BlueCornRecipes

I've seen recipes for #ChamisaAsh (#CulinaryAsh) that involve wood chips, mountain sage, #juniper, and epazote herbs, burned to fine white ashes. I also found this from a #Navajo recipe for Corn Ice (Da’yis tiin).

"A Note on Culinary Ash

Culinary ash dates back thousands of years and has been used by Native communities throughout the Americas for millennia. It is primarily made from shrubs and trees growing near or around the Native communities that use it. The Navajo primarily use juniper ash. Chef Walter Whitewater and his family have been using juniper ash in their traditional dishes since he was a little boy.

"Juanita Tiger Kavena, author of Hopi Cookery, who has since passed, talks in her cookbook about the #Hopi using the ash from #corncobs, #CornSilk, and #CornHusks, as well as the #FourWingSaltbush (#AtriplexCanescens), which is also called #chamisa. Her son, Wilmer Kavena Jr., whom I know as Chibbon (which is Creek for 'little boy'), says that the four-wing saltbush is the preferred bush for the Hopi but that ash can be made from burning any bushes. He prefers to make ash from the four-wing saltbush since these bushes are more #alkaline and work better with the #corn. And Brandon Baugh from San Felipe Pueblo, my student from the Indigenous Concepts of Native American Food class at the Institute of American Indian Arts, researched the use of ash in his community and at San Felipe Pueblo for his final paper and presentation, and found that in his community they use juniper, four-wing saltbush, and onion ash. Other Native communities all over the United States use various materials, including the ash from certain types of #wood.

Culinary ash can be sourced from Shimà of Navajoland and Blue Corn Custom Designs, among others."

https://www.ediblenm.com/graces-corn-ice-dayis-tiin/

#SolarPunkSunday #TraditionalFoods
#TraditionalRecipes #HopiRecipes
#NavajoRecipes #PlantAshes