I should really categorize this idea as just beyond my front door. I walk in pine forests at least once a week, and walk by pine trees daily. We have used spruce in a fair number of dishes, we were surrounded by them in Colorado, so it seemed natural that pine would eventually figure into our cooking here. It is just that it took so long for us to integrate it into a dish.
As the thunder clouds stacked in the sky and the lightning sparked like steel on flint, my mind wandered to the tall lightning rods which surrounded me, the pine trees. I reached out and grabbed a handful of the needles and just pulled. The smell was fresh, clean and of the forest. This was not Pine Sol or another chemical smell. The moisture in the air and the resin on my hands united into a brilliant olfactory sensation. And so I needed to get this essence as light and fragrant as it is into a dish.
Powder could work. I could make pine needle powder. I started with pine needle oil, an infusion of the needles and olive oil which I strained. I then mixed the oil with tapioca maltodextrin. The result was pine needle powder. This powder became the unity I needed for a dish I was working on with musk and honeydew melons. It brought the flavors together and in reflection, the pine flavor made the dish.
