The fall season is my most favorite time of the year, but especially for one reason that helps me ensure who I am and what I was taught as a child growing up. I am a descendant of the Northern Mewuk, my family’s village was Hec-chin-nu which is located in the Railroad Flat area in Calaveras County in the Central Sierra Foothills.
In the fall it was very important to my mom, grandmother and great aunties to go out and gather the black oak acorns. Acorn was a stable food in the old days and this nut is responsible for helping the Mewuk and other tribes throughout the state survive. It has all the nutrition needed and to live on the nupa (acorn soup in our language) when weather was poor, other foods were gone and hiding in places to keep us safe was what had to be done, our acorn saved us.
So, today my family still holds the tradition strong of collecting, cooking and eating our nupa. We don’t cook it every day, in today’s world I guess you would call it a delicacy now. We make it for family gatherings, funerals, birthdays, celebrations for very special occasions. Sometimes I will cook some nupa just to make sure it is shared by others.
This year my son Carson helped me cook the nupa. He was what we call the ‘rock carrier’. In order for us to cook our nupa traditionally we have to first cook the rocks. These are special rocks; they can be either basalt or soapstone. Basalt rocks are what we use. The basalt rock comes from volcanic activity, so they are able to hold the heat. We cook the rocks in the fire for over an hour, until the rocks are orange in color (kind of like the color of iron when it’s hot). Carson has to pick up those rocks one at a time, with the biggest chop stick looking poles that usually start out at about 6-8 feet tall (over the years of cooking they dwindle down to 3-4 feet and then they are too short to use with the fire.
He quickly immerses the rock, one at a time, in clean, clear water (to clean and get the ash off) then he carefully brings the hot rock to me and releases it to me while I am holding a loop stir stick and paddle to guide the rock down into the pot. He will continue to bring me rocks until I have at least 4-6 rocks in the pot. I continue to stir my rock around not letting them sit in one place, this is to help distribute the heat for cooking. When the rocks begin to lose their heat I will take one rock out at a time and Carson will then replace that rock with another rock from the fire. It usually takes between 10-15 rocks to complete the cooking (depends on how big the batch is). Usually by the 8th rock my nupa is steaming and getting ready for a boil. Once the boiling point happens the nupa is done cooking. In the old days the steps of making acorn- the cracking, cleaning, grinding and leaching- was done every day to ensure there was more to cook tomorrow.
In years past my sister Kimberly Stevenot has helped us cook the nupa for the Acorn Festival here on the Tuolumne Rancheria. The picture here shows us both cooking a batch of nupa. We cook the nupa in the Hangi (Round House) which is the dance house and is to be respected like one would for their place of worship. Since I can remember my great aunties have always cooked the nupa in the round house and we still do it the same way. I love that picture of my sister and me cooking the nupa together in the round house sharing a long line of family tradition. I actually love both pictures as I am proud of the fact that my son Carson has learned and holds on the traditions too.
Since this pandemic hit the world the Tuolumne Band of Me-Wuk did not have their annual Acorn Festival which is always on the second weekend of September. Instead we cooked nupa to give to the people who always look forward to the nupa, our elders especially. When we cook nupa for the Acorn Festival we will sometimes cook up to 8-10 batches of nupa. This oftentimes can be up to 20-25 gallons of nupa cooked. At the Acorn Festival nupa is offered to the public to taste and we always send nupa home with our visiting elders, dancers, singers and those that have traveled a long way just to be able to enjoy the nupa.
As mentioned the Acorn Festival is always held on the second weekend of September. We are hoping next year it will be held once again. It is open to the public that weekend and you can taste the nupa, eat Indian tacos but more importantly watch the California native dancers (from many tribes of California) dance, sing and give thanks for our acorn.
I hope you enjoyed my very first blog. I look forward to opportunities such as this to share my culture and tradition digitally with the world!
Stay safe,
Jennifer Bates