Anybody know the name of the berry the Navaho use to make this drink, other than chilchen?

Edit: It is one of the few wild berry foods in the USDA nutrition databank.

http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/cgi-bin/list_nut_edit.pl

Help me out. Your link displayed as a blank page when I clicked it. Any translation for chilchin? There is a community on the reservation, Chilchinbito, which translates as " chilchin water(spring). My Navajo is pretty elementary.

The only berry I can think of that is widely distributed in the Navajo Reservation is juniper. There are probably quite a few berry plants with restricted distributions, however.

Most Navajo children I have known are avid coca-cola drinkers; their parents prefer coffee.

Hmm,I went again to the page and copied the URL, but you are right it did not work.

Try here: http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

Enter "berry", search down to find chilchin (Navaho red berry drink), and if you want go on to the nutrient page.

OK, my search for Chilchin on the web gives me Rhus trilobata (skunkbush sumac)

I am not familiar with the plant myself so no help from me on how to use it.
Here are some sites talking about it

http://www.turtlelakerefuge.org/Turtle%20Lake%20Refuge/Webpages/Sumac.html

http://plants.usda.gov/java/profile?symbol=RHTR

I hit a couple of references to chilchin pudding too.

Homerun, scafool!

Thanks.

In the book Native American Ethnobotany by Daniel E. Moerman, there is a reference to drinks made from crushed berries of certain members of the Arctostaphylos family. The specific ones mentioned as Navajo sources are A. pringlei (Pringle Manzanita), A. pumila (Sandmat Manzanita) and A. patula (Greenleaf Manzanita).

Other tribes used other varieties of Arctostaphylos that were available in their area, but some of them were mainly used as medication.

Sue

Looking at the ethnography on the USDA site many groups other than Navaho made chilchin or chilchen from berries.

I am checking this stuff out as an ongoing project to find winter calories in the wild. I am not sure yet when sumac berries get ripe, but I will find out.

"I am not sure yet when sumac berries get ripe, but I will find out."

From an article in Countryside & Small Stock Journal, "Sumac, the Wild Lemonade Berry" at http://www.countrysidemag.com/issues/87/87-4/Sam_Thayer.html ...

"You want to get the berries when they are dark red and fully mature, so that they have fully developed their tart flavor, but before the rain has had the opportunity to wash the flavor out. In most of North America, the first clusters are ready to be plucked sometime in July, with the prime time being in early August. Taste each cluster as you harvest to assure yourself that you are collecting something with flavor since occasionally they are bland. A dark purple coloration usually indicates that the flavor of the fruit has developed fully; yet some of the best clusters I've tasted were light pink. Sometimes a white, sticky substance coats the berry heads; this is pure essence of sumac flavor-don't let it scare you off. I pluck about six to eight average-sized clusters for a pitcher of sumac-ade."

Thanks, Sue!