Spruce Syrup

It is probably one of the most despised trees, the Norway Spruce. The plantations of it that infect our Western hills are dead places, few birds live there - only the firey goldcrest, and no plant can live beneath their thick shading foliage.

But the scent of pine is warm and seductive, and the great Scandinavian chefs have made a feature of them. Last autumn, at a game dinner, Mickael Viljanen first marinated venison with spruce and orange, so I turned to him for advice. Mickael suggested I make a syrup, which can then be cut with vinegar to use as a glaze on game in the autumn. The shoots are out now (mid May). They are softer than they look and have a lemony flavour.

Chef Enda McEvoy recommended I cook them with butter, pot roasted with cauliflower. In the book NOMA, Redzepi makes a spruce juice with sorrel juice and apple juice, all blended together and he serves them with cheese. Well a type of cheese, made from milk cream, buttermilk and rennet, but I won’t go there.

I decided to make the syrup. I picked some spruce shoots from one of those dreaded plantations that, thankfully are no longer so densely planted round here. Recent plantations in our valley have seen much more mixed planting. Maybe it’s because the White Deal that comes from the Norway Spruce isn’t half so valuable any more.

My mistake, this first time, was to overboil the syrup. I’ve been left with an interesting flavoured golden syrup, which, with vinegar is quite special. We’ve also eaten it on porridge, and used it to make tiny dollops of spruce essence around some grilled T-bone. Very cheffy.

A word of warning: when foraging for pine make sure to choose a spruce, and not its pine friend the Yew. Yews are those dark, dank, sombre trees you often see in churchyards, killing everything around them with their shade. They are very poisonous.

On a cheerier note, I’m now looking for species of the stone pine (Pinus pine) - these are the ones that give you pine nuts.

Spruce Syrup

1 litre water
450g granulated sugar
180g spruce shoots

Dissolve the sugar in the water over heat, and then add the spruce shoots. Simmer for about 5 hours. Strain, then place the liquid back in the saucepan and boil until it thickens. Bottle.

The syrup will last for months in the bottle, and indeed its flavour gets better and stronger over time.



Thanks to Mickael Viljanen, Chef at Gregans Castle @stove28 www.gregans.ie and to Enda McEvoy, Galway chef @endamcevoy. NOMA, by René Redzepi is published by Phaidon.