Clockwise From Top: Spruce Oil, Spruce Butter, Spruce Spice, Spruce Vinegar

Each year more than 100 million trees are produced for Christmas worldwide. Considering that it takes 8 to 12 years to produce a decent-sized tree, it seems pointless simply to discard this bounty after only a few weeks of using it as ornamentation. I don’t mean to sermonize. I want only to point out that food is everywhere, that a tree is more than a symbol or a decoration: it is delicious food.

This year, let’s all butcher the tree.

– René Redzepi

On The Public Denuding Of A Discarded Christmas Tree For Food

It was a few days after New Year’s, and I was strolling down the street toward my local coffee shop when it appeared before me, discarded and forgotten. My newest food source.

Should I Strip This Bare Of Needles In Public? I Should.

I went back home, grabbed a plastic bag, returned and began to pull needles by the handful into the bag.  In broad daylight. Next to a high school.  And a Boy Scouts office.  Kids walked past with their backpacks.  Cars pulled out of the Boy Scouts parking lot and drove past.  I was very aware of how strange I must have looked denuding a discarded tree on the side of the road, but thought I would be totally ignored for that very reason.  I was correct.  Soon, though, my discomfort got the best of me and I felt I had gotten enough. Yet, I returned after dark to get some more. Foolhardy? Completely ridiculous? Perhaps. But I had to keep in the spirit of the opinion piece.  Waste not, want not!

SprucE Butter

With my new batch of needles, I went to work.  I washed them and threw a few tablespoons in with some butter and lemon thyme into my VitaMix and let her rip.

I strained the liquid into a container and threw it in the fridge.  An hour later, spruce butter.  I’m a frickin’ genius.

Spruce Oil

Wait, no I am not.  This one I managed to screw up.  The recipe calls for 3.5 ounces of needles.  This is a lot of needles!  It also calls for 3.5 ounces of vinegar.  That’s it?  Mm.

3 1/2 oz. of vinegar for that many needles?

It was such a tiny amount I went ahead and doubled it.  And for my efforts?  A little thimble full of spruce vinegar.  What a waste of needles!  I am NOT stalking my neighborhood for more trees.  It’s way after Christmas, anyways.  Man.

Spruce Oil

So next up was spruce oil.  First, I weighed out my 3.5 ounces of needles and blanched them.

Then I added 1 1/4 cup of grapeseed oil.  Wait.  1 1/4 cups.  That makes sense.  I bet the New York Times printed the recipe wrong for the vinegar.  It must have been 1 1/4 cups of vinegar.  Ack.  If I had done the oil first, I would have seen that and made the adjustment.  Ah well.  Anyhow, the oil turned out great.

Spruce Spice

I took some needles and grinded them in my coffee bean grinder.  Exciting!

Sprucing Up A Meal

So now I had my spruce ingredients – what to make?  I riffed off a couple of ideas some friends had for a dish – pork chops with a sour apple chutney and honey roasted root vegetables.  Me?  Sous vide bison rib eye with a cranberry spruce chutney and a honey roasted root vegetable puree.  Booyah!

After cooking this up, I read the comments on the opinion piece and everyone was pointing out how Christmas trees could be covered in flame retardant and who else knows what.  I did find mine just lying on the side of the road.  Yes, well. I’m still alive so I guess I was lucky.  I think a short drive to the mountains would be a better method next time.  You know, actually, if you get a Christmas tree next year, go cut it down yourself.  You never know if you’re going to eat it later.

Jethro