Processing Walnuts

We don’t have any walnut trees on our property, but that doesn’t mean we don’t get walnuts. A friend has a walnut tree, and I had expressed interest in getting some earlier in the year. This past week we received a five gallon bucket with the ones that had fallen on the ground so far.

I’ve never processed walnuts, so I checked it out on the Internet first. I did know ahead of time that contact with the husks will stain things. I have a friend who processes walnuts and her hands turned black when her gloves leaked. I use nitrile exam gloves to protect my hands. They almost worked flawlessly until the thumb broke. Now the tip of my thumb is brownish/black. lol. It doesn’t look nice. Next time I will wear two pairs or some heavy duty kitchen gloves. The rotten ones got tossed into the compost bucket along with the husks. Yes, you can compost them just like the forest naturally does.

The process is pretty simple. The husks come right off by hand to reveal the walnut inside. Removing the husks is required before drying and storing. It was recommended to use a wire screen to dry them. I didn’t have that, so I’m using some old boxes and rotating them. They should dry in a couple weeks.

Some useful links I found when learning about walnuts:

• Harvest Black Walnuts
• Harvesting Black Walnuts
• Composting Black Walnut Husks