Ash keys as food

[xylaria]

I didn't know you could eat these tree seeds. Are there any you can't eat? Might go and try some, I have a sycamore outside my house as well

Not all tree seeds are edible, and some are pretty toxic.
Google anything before eating.
It takes a bit knowledge of how plants are related to each other before experimenting.

What you can eat is a sliding scale, yummy eat in quatity, pretty grim but not toxic, slightly toxic but tastes good, not worth eating because it lacks edible texture or nutrition, quite toxic eaten in poland in 1950s, noticably toxic, this will kill you of some queer disease after a period of time, this will kill you pretty quickly.

 

[Andy B]

Not all tree seeds are edible, and some are pretty toxic.
Google anything before eating.
It takes a bit knowledge of how plants are related to each other before experimenting.

What you can eat is a sliding scale, yummy eat in quatity, pretty grim but not toxic, slightly toxic but tastes good, not worth eating because it lacks edible texture or nutrition, quite toxic eaten in poland in 1950s, noticably toxic, this will kill you of some queer disease after a period of time, this will kill you pretty quickly.

Agreed. An of course never eat anything that you found about on the internet without checking a few other sources first!!!!

 

[mountainm]

Agreed. An of course never eat anything that you found about on the internet without checking a few other sources first!!!!

Some things are apparently Yummy but highly toxic too...

 

[scoops_uk]

I had some ash key pickle at the weekend, it was delicious. In a proper i'd eat this every day sort of way. I think it was made from a recipe in Richard Mabey's Food for free, but there are a lot of editions of that book and I don't know which it was.As I understand it, it was basically ash keys, vinegar, pepper corns and one or two other spices.Scoops

 

[scoops_uk]

Found it my 1973 edition!

Boil young green keys in water, change water and boil again. Then pickle under hot spiced vinegar.

Not the most detailed recipe, but you get the jist!

Scoops

 

[Toddy]

re-booting an old thread

So, it's December, it's sodden wet, the days are short and cold, but there's still foraging about.
Today I have munched,
Bittercress (which isn't bitter, but peppery )
Raisined wild strawberries,
Sycamore peas,
Rosehips,
Mint
Sorrel
Plantain seeds
and the lesser celandines are starting to show leaves so there are bulbs beneath those too.
I still see acorns and brambles too, but didn't have any today.

Anyone else foraging ?

M

 

[Woody girl]

Ok Toddy I'll be with you in half an hour! Yes there is still quite a bit around if you look. Picked navelwort or pennywort the other day. Delicious in a cheddar cheese sandwich.

 

[Robson Valley]

Toddy: how many times could you make a meal of that? Is there enough to harvest and hold?
Anybody ever smoke and dry crayfish?

We can be knee deep in Vaccinium species of blueberries, as far as you can see in August.
Ankle deep in wild strawberries, fringed with wild raspberry. Even the dogs know what to eat.

By this time, the resident birds and squirrels have consumed all the easily foraged shrub and tree fruits.
The squirrels have built their cone caches (some might be 4' tall and 6' across) for the winter.

So there's nary a nibble for us human geezers. I've been hoping to find a patch of
freshwater clams to smoke and dry but I have seen nothing at all in this district.

 

[Woody girl]

Come and get some of your crayfish back! They are decimating our natives. Plenty for all! Tasty too!

 

[Toddy]

Reply to RV.
I'm vegetarian, there's no doubt about it, I'd need a lot of square miles of choice pickings, or blooming good storage quarters, to get safely through Winter and Spring.
That said, within ten minutes walk of my home, I know where there's at least fifty acres of reedmace, where there's the dried edges worth gleaning of oats and wheat, where there are silverweed, where there are old neglected orchards with withered fruits still around. Unfortunately the grey squirrels eat every blooming hazelnut before they're ripe otherwise that would be a standard Winter crop for here since the Mesolithic.

If I were a meat eater, then the nearest river has both salmon and seatrout, (and the damned crayfish too) and there are deer a-plenty in our local woodlands, and those woodlands run along the river sides for miles, and join up to huge parks and a patchwork of forests and farmlands. Not a lot of rabbits though, but a lot of deer. Lot of wildfowl too.

Sustainable ? not with our present population if everyone decided to feed from the wild.

 

[Janne]

Do not the American Signal crayfish carry a disease that kills off the European species?

I recall heroic attempts in Sweden to eradicate them in some areas, and I believe it did not work to well.
Us hobby fishermen were said to spread the disease with our fishing equipment.

Seeds: seeds eaten by squirrels and mice are usually quite palatable.
I used to enjoy beech nuts. Did break a cusp ( part of tooth) once though when I crscked the husk on one. Also the seeds from spruce and pine, nice if you like the taste of resin.
Think Retsina.

 

[Broch]

It's hard to fathom but we appear to have some spring crops showing signs here - there's certainly enough young tender nettle to use. We still have wild marjoram, brooklime, bittercress, even sorrel leaves. We also have a number of mushrooms still around.

As far as crayfish go, if you stick to the law, you need a licence to catch them. This is to make sure you know the difference between the invaders and the indigenous species. Also, there is concern that taking the larger signal crayfish (Pacifastacus leniusculus) actually increases their population because they are cannibalistic and eat smaller ones! But, for a meat eater, there are plenty of grey squirrel around

I've tried the pickled ash keys; not very impressed to be honest but I may try again.

 

[Nomad64]

I've tried the pickled ash keys; not very impressed to be honest but I may try again.

+1

 

[Janne]

Many wild foods taste a lot. Too much for our taste buds, that have gotten used to tasteless cultivated stuff.
Beef vs buffalo
Wild fish vs crap like Tillapia
Wild shrimp vs farmed s.e. Asian shrimp. Much, much mire!

Anybody eat young leaves of Dandelion? Delicious. A bit of Olive or even better, coldpressed Rapeseed Oil, a squeeze of lemon or lime, salt.

Mother did a bit of research on wild foods, and fermenting and pickling was some of the methods she used.
I remember shoots of some tree she pickled, but the pickling was sweeter than you Brits use. Do not remember which tree. Large buds. Large young shoots.
If you can buy Del Monte crincle cut pickled red beets, that is about the sour/sweet proportion.

 

[Woody girl]

Part of my small garden is wild. Bramble nettle wild garlic and strawberry... and dandelions. .. hundreds of them. Wine from the flowers also use instead of saffron to colour rice dishes.sprinkle petals onto a salad. Blanch leaves with a flowerpot and they are a much sweeter salad green. Roast roots for coffee. Feed the neighbours rabbits and guinea pigs with the less tasty leaves (eat the rabbit ?) Then there is also dyeing uses. Oh the humble dandylion.. Nettles food ,cordage,dying,tea medicine 101uses.

 

[Woody girl]

Oh forgot to add put the dandelion sap on a wart and it's supposed to cure it never tried this mind as so far I'm wart free... could be all the dandelions I eat is preventative ?

 

[Toddy]

We use different pickling mixes though Janne. The ladies of the assorted W.I.s and rurals would have your head for thinking so little of our pickles
They have thousands of recipes for them.
Sweet pickle isn't spiced pickle and nor is it strong pickle for onions or eggs.
Just depends I suppose on what you're making.
Some pickling vinegar is so strong that it burns as it goes down, while that for things like courgettes (tiny marrows) is usually sweet and seasoned with seeds and herbs.
Then we get the ones that have become standard fayre since the Empire, from Africa and India and Sri Lanka, etc., curried or made with dried sour fruits like tamarinds, or hot with ginger or horseradish.
Huge regional variations across these islands.

 

[Broch]

Slightly off-topic I know but I had roll mop herring in a pub on the Isle of Skye a few years ago - the best I've ever had, a sweet non-acid pickle that was delicious. I thought they came from Andy Race in Mallaig but they say not and I've not managed to find any to buy. I've tried doing them myself but I've just not got the recipe right

 

[Janne]

I am sure there is a huge variety of pickling solutions, but I did find most products I bought in the shops a tad to acidic and a tad not enough sweet. The mentioned beets are perfect for my palate.


Broch, are you able to buy Icelandic salt herring?

The Swedish pickling receipes for ‘inlagd sill ‘might suit you, sweeter than the Germsn pickling for Rollmops.
But you need salted herring.

 

[Broch]

Broch, are you able to buy Icelandic salt herring?

The Swedish pickling receipes for ‘inlagd sill ‘might suit you, sweeter than the Germsn pickling for Rollmops.
But you need salted herring.

Yes we can - or at least it claims to be. We can also get Norwegian salted herring. I'll look up 'inlagd sill' and see how it compares to the recipes I've got. The one I tried was done in two stages - salting first (presumably to dry it) then sweet pickle; it just wasn't the same as the ones I had on Skye