wild food, wild places, wild times
The term ‘foraging’ can be a loose one. The Oxford English Dictionary says “(of a person or animal) search widely for food or provisions.” But you needn’t hike for miles in the wilderness in search of your ingredients. That wide search can begin on your doorstep; in your own garden, in parks, on waste ground,…
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The greens of summer fade toward the golds and rusts of autumn. This morning is a dim one, with thin mist curling across the meadows. The sun breaks the horizon. The mist takes on colours, hazing pink and orange as its fingers reach across the land. More rain is promised. Grey clouds hang fat and…
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After a long hot summer here in France, autumn has finally arrived. The sun has calmed its fury, and retired behind the clouds. Rain is forecast and will be relief to the wildlife and the farm animals alike. Three young roe deer flit daily across the fields behind the house, buzzards and kites fill the…
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An early lesson I learned when I began foraging was this: there is a difference between “you can eat it” and “you should eat it”. Depending on your tolerance for bitterness, hairiness, or astringency, there are some wild foods that are technically edible but also technically horrible. Conversely there are some incredible and unique ingredients…
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Chicken-of-the-woods (Laetiporus sulphureus) is a startling fungus. Often bright yellow, and rather alien in appearance, it grows mostly on the trunks of oak trees, though sometimes on poplar or yew. It is a parasitic fungus, and eventually causes the rot and death of its host. It is fairly easy to identify. Young specimens are bright to pale…
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One of the challenges of growing your own food is that, if you want to grow a lot of it, you need to figure out a way of stopping it going bad before you eat it. The season for some fruits and vegetables is short. Some need very specific growing conditions. Tomatoes, for example, need…
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The fields, forests, and hedgerows of Europe are, as well as being full of edibles, a medicine cabinet. There are plants and fungi that have been used for hundreds of years to treat various ailments and complaints. Some are of questionable virtue (or there is certainly little evidence of their efficacy save for anecdote). Others…
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Wild strawberries (Fragaria vesca) are a revelation. If you’ve never tried them before, imagine the very essence of strawberry. They are the real thing, with the flavour of commercially available fruit being a shade, a rumour of the true nature of this berry. This is hyperbole, of course. There are plenty of varieties of cultivated…
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For any gardener, some tasks are a joy and others are more of a chore. Weeding certainly comes under the latter heading, though it can be quite relaxing to zone out and listen to the birds and the crickets while you work. Here on our smallholding we are experimenting with something I have termed ‘wild…
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There was always going to be a first to go. This new life of ours is full of firsts; first animals, first floods, first taste of homegrown aubergines. All new, all delightful or difficult or frightening. And there was always going to be a first to die. Like many fledgling smallholders, our initial foray into…
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