Foraging - Natures Food

RAS

Hi

mache = lamb's lettuce or cornsalad

Not the time of year for most fungi and the season is a bit late this year bit you might well find hairy bittercress. Lovely stuff, much nicer then land cress and more interesting than watercress IMO. It is very early - usually February onwards but my plants have not really got going yet (I spread the seeds on my plot and harvest it from there rather than the cat ridden lawn.)

I recommend Roger Phillips "Wild Food" as a good book to find free edibles.

Coming soon

The wild garlic, which I love gently wilted and stirred into scrambled egg.

Corn salad

Japanese knotweed - supposed to be possible to eat the very young stems like asparagus.

have you thought about harvesting tree sap?

Also identify the local beech trees and make noyeau when the leaves open.

rubytuesday

I have Food For Free by Richard Mabey.

giantmutantbroccoli

I was fooled by the surprisingly warm weather this morning. Still going to go foraging tomorrow but I doubt I'll find much that I recognise!
Thanks everybody for the suggestions - especially the links, they look really handy.

RAS - hairy bittercress sounds good, I'll keep an eye out for it. I love watercress soup but it is kind of bland (and expensive!).
Tree sap? Is that for making syrup or is there something else you can do with it?
Never heard of noyeau before but it looks brilliant - and I have a beech tree in my back garden! Actually lots of saplings I need to uproot, so I can strip those. They make useful pea sticks as well.

Haven't been to the glen yet but mostly there just seems to be buds everywhere. I'm thinking I might pickle some to use as capers, once I've looked up which are good to eat.

Not exactly wild food but I've been looking speculatively at the crocuses in my garden. I know they're not saffron crocuses because mine are spring-flowering - plus they don't have the giant stamens. I've looked online to see if they're poisonous but I can't find anything useful - most of what google turns up is about autumn crocuses which are mostly very poisonous. Anyone know about spring crocuses? Can you use the stamens as a saffron substitute or is that a crazy idea?

Someday I'll start my own garden from scratch, and evrything in it will be edible

celyn90

I love foraging

giantmutantbroccoli wrote: »

Unfortunatly I don't have a guide to funghi at the moment so I won't be picking anything exotic. If I'm lucky enough to find some field mushrooms, or oyster mushrooms (yeah right) I'll grab 'em. Maybe a giant puffball. I know enough not to take anything that I don't recognise, better safe than sorry.

It's a bit early for field mushrooms - you are looking at summer/autumn for these. Likewise with giant puffballs - these are mainly a summer/autumn thing too

There isn't a great deal around this time of year - you might find jelly ears, velvet shanks (a bit late, but we got lucky a couple of weeks ago), oysters, chicken of the woods, morels (a bit early, but you might be lucky).

frogglet

Just be careful picking and eating things you aren't sure about http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1258895/Mother-died-eating-death-cap-mushrooms-picked-Botanic-Gardens.html

Kevie192

Hi all,

I would like to get out into the wild and pick some wild flowers / berries / mushrooms etc. I wondered if anyone can recommend some useful website or guidebooks that will help me to get started?

Thanks,

Kevin

Pink.

Hi Kevie,

I can't recommend a book, but there are a few threads on Old Style that may help:

Foraging - Natures Food

Free Food Challenge

Cheap food if you aren't squeamish

There is also a lot of information on foraging (not just blackberries) on this thread: blackberry picking

What you find will depend a lot on what is in season at the moment. You can find more information on that on the Foraging forum on www.downsizer.net

I'll add your thread to the first link later as it helps other readers to find the information together.

Pink

rubytuesday

Richard Mabey Food for Free. I'm going to make nettle soup. Unfortunately the nettles will be coming fro my garden!:rotfl:

Trinny

Hi There

I agree with the threads Pink suggested and also have a copy of food for free, which i recommend.:)

I have been foraging for a few years now, its a gradual thing - learning to identify wild food, and it takes time to learn to recognise each plant. I would heartily recommend going on a guided walk (we have them organised by the local council). There are too many dangerous look-alike plants out there - and you need to be taught at the beginning by an expert. The courses are cheap to go on - and i learnt lots.

As for seashore foraging - john wright does the excellent "edible seashore" which is part of the river cottage guides.

I dont go anywhere near mushrooms and fungi though - they are extremely difficult to identify, and a good number are poisonous with no antidote. Mushrooms also tend to mix species - so safe and poisonous mushrooms grow often side by side and look very similar.

Trin

LJM

i would suggest googling for foraging groups in your area this is what i wanted to do and go walking with an expert so i know what to pick