What does "Kinnickinnic" Mean?
Kinnickinnic (an Ojibwe word) literally means
"what is mixed," and refers to plant materials that
Indian people mixed with tobacco for smoking. Use of
Kinnickinnic was widespread in North America but the
ingredients varied regionally. In the Woodlands, the
favorite ingredients were the inner bark of certain
willows, dogwoods, or sumac leaves. The final
mixture usually only contained about one third
tobacco.
To prepare Kinnickinnic, a man cut red osier
dogwood stems and carried them back home where he
scraped off the outer bark with a pocket knife. With
the back of the knife blade, he then scraped
curlicues of inner bark from the stem, and allowed
them to fall in a cloth placed over his lap. He then
made a drying rack by splitting one of the peeled
stems halfway down and opening the end to form a Y.
The opened portion was then woven with criss-crosses
of other split stems to form a grid, and on this he
placed the curlicues of inner bark. He forced the
rack into the ground diagonally, just above a low
fire, so the bark was about a foot above the flames
and could dry in the heat without being burned. In
about twenty minutes the bark was toasted and crisp
and could be pulverized to the consistency of a
rough-cut tobacco by rubbing it between the palms.
From:
www.mpm.edu/wirp/ICW-32.html |
The "Kinni" as it is commonly known is the
"home" stream of the Kiap-TU-Wish Chapter of Trout Unlimited.
Located in both St. Croix and Pierce Counties for West Central
Wisconsin the Kinni is less than an hour drive from both St. Paul,
MN. and Minneapolis, MN. and the surrounding metro