Do you regularly forage?

[Tony]

I was thinking ahead to the better weather and looking forward to bringing the odd foraged addition to our meals and it got me wondering how many regularly forage to put food on the table, i'm not really talking about hunting but plants, berries, herbs etc We bring them home if they're convenient to our walk or activity and I expect this is the same as many of us, I expect though that some fo us actually go out to forage to put food on the table, maybe through need but maybe because it's a good resource that we generally don't take enough advantage of.

If you do forage for the dinner table to any degree what sort of things do you usually get or really look hard for?

 

[MartiniDave]

It is something I really love to do, but in reality we usually just end up picking blackberries, sloes and rose hips for pie & crumble, gin and syrup respectively.
Of course, you may consider bagging the odd rabbit or pigeon foraging too.
I also gather stuff like birch bark, king Alfred's cakes, sticks, withies etc as and when I see them.

Dave

 

[Scots_Charles_River]

Sept-Oct out canoeing I tend to always get a berrie or bramble snack.

 

[BILLy]

I snack rather than bring it home to cook/ process, if I see it on my walk I'll eat some of it, berries of coarse, wood sorrel, nettle, etc, only things that I past on a walk really, and because my knowledge of what to forage is limited then so is my fair, it's something I really enjoy doing and would love to know more of what can be foraged and processed form the wild, I don't think in general I make the most of what the seasons have on offer, it maybe because of knowledge (no excuses) or because of limited places to forage, or neither,
Good thread, looking forward to other views.
Whilst we are on this point, would a sticky thread be a good idea to have where we can have an input on what can be foraged and what is being foraged at the specific time of year, for example don't put berries in the post if you haven't or can't collect them at this time of year? Or maybe it already been done somewhere.

 

[BILLy]

Sorry Tony, where you talking specifically edible? Or in season general?

 

[John Fenna]

In season I like to harvest Alexanders, Ransoms and nettles (my nettle and ransom soup is legendary - ask Mesquite about its "medicinal effects!).
Jack -by-the-Hedge wrapped in fresh young Beech leaves with a side of Wall Pennywort (Navelwort) is a great snack or picnic addition while Dandelion, nettles and autumn fruits end up on my table in bottles as wine. Autumn fruits are also the basis of all our jams plus more than a few pies, crumbles etc...
By far my favourite "forage" is Birch Sap and I make loads of wine from this - and some of the wine is accepted by the owner of one of the woods I play in (and forage from) as "payment" for sole user perm

 

[munkiboi182]

I forage all the time. I earn very little so I supplement my meals with anything I can forage. Food for free is the way for me.

 

[Clouston98]

It is something I really love to do, but in reality we usually just end up picking blackberries, sloes and rose hips for pie & crumble, gin and syrup respectively.
Of course, you may consider bagging the odd rabbit or pigeon foraging too.
I also gather stuff like birch bark, king Alfred's cakes, sticks, withies etc as and when I see them.

Dave

That's a lot like me, I have the "possum mentality" too .

 

[Mesquite]

In season I like to harvest Alexanders, Ransoms and nettles (my nettle and ransom soup is legendary - ask Mesquite about its "medicinal effects!).

Hmmmm, yes John's troll snot soup had a rather... how shall I put it 'cleansing' effect on me at 3am whilst at the moot. I think I broke the record for the clenched buttock dash from Dingly Dell to the loos.

Mind you I did get my own back on John when he had my extremely delicious fajitas. Everyone else who had them were fine but John had a similar reaction to them that I did to his soup. Luckily for him though his dash for the facilities wasn't as far as we'd installed our en-suite by then

As for my foraging, like others, it tends to be for things like damsons, raspberries and blackberries for jams and pies rather than a regular thing to put food on the plate.

 

[British Red]

We gather a great deal of wild food. I hesitate to use the word "forage" - that has overtones of searching to me - we know where the wild food is around here and have permission to take what we do. We gather samphire, elderflower, elderberry, bullace, blackberry, ramsoms, jack by the hedge, horse radish and many more. I wouldn't describe what we do as "regular" so much as "seasonal" in that all these things has a time when it needs to be gathered and processed.

 

[treadlightly]

Ransoms, jack by the hedge and nettles are my favourites in spring, then blackberries, sloes, elderberries, rosehips in autumn.
It's an occasional thing for me. I know where these grow and if I'm able will go look for them and bring them home. Not regular or organised, just as the mood takes.

 

[Mafro]

I forage lots, both to eat fresh and to preserve.
I am am massive fungi fan, so Autumn see my basket full of various fungi. Most get eaten, but I always try to dry enough boletes and winter chanterelles for the rest of the year. Autumn also sees our fruit bowl always full of apples, pears, plums, greengages and loads of nuts. These all great eaten fresh, dried and turned into alcohol.
I also eat plenty of food from the sea. Cockles, mussels, winkles, clams, shrimp, and then the greens such as sea beet, alexanders, fennel, purslane, samphire etc..
And then there is the normal greens, jack by the hedge, ramsons, nettles, hog weed, plaintain, ladys smock, dandelion etc..
I also process acorns and sweet chestnuts into flours.

There is loads out there, and its really interesting to cook with.

 

[Andy W]

Wild garlic and brambles, some times wild strawberries. Not educated enough to try fungi.

 

[slowworm]

I regularly collect ramsons, nettles, sorrel and marsh thistle during spring; blackberries and hazel nuts in autumn and fungi such as chanterelles and ceps whenever they're about. There's plenty of other things I will collect if I find them but there's not a huge range about locally. I'm adding some more edible plants to the patch of woodland I own to increase what I can collect although that's verging on grow your own. I've added things like lime trees for their leaves, hops for their shoots and flowers, more blackberries and other soft fruit to go feral, a few damsons and other trees.

 

[xylaria]

We forage. Sometimes we deliberately go out to a place where there is bounty of something (chestnuts, shellfish) and sometimes it is just been opertunistic. We have hardly foraged anything recently, I have a limit of how much rain and wind is safe or tolerable to go out in. We had a nice wild parsnip soup yesterday, but not a lot else since before Christmas

My local beach has had quite a battering, the seabeet patch has gone and i havent got out to mussel bed, but we have managed to womble a fishing net, petrol can and a very posh coat from the weather

 

[Harvestman]

I forage opportunistically, rather than setting out with a purpose, except when it comes to autumn fruit like apples and pears, but then I have access to an ancient orchard, so I can.

 

[tom.moran]

i havent really foraged before apart from the obvious fruits while out and about. i have bought a couple of books that ive been reading up on though as im happy i can set up camp, make fire, use knives and axe's perfectly well the next skill i really want is to be able to go out for 24/48 hours and survive on finding food

 

[historymerchants]

If I'm out for a walk then the chance to add anything to the table is always good. I have not bought a jar of jam or chutney for the last ten years or so. I make it from what comes out of the garden or hedgerow. Just started making some cider this year with some apples a friend doesn't use with some foraged crab apples.

 

[Toddy]

More a kind of munch as I go foraging for me. Fruits and fungi, nuts and pollen apart that is, and the occasional stuff deliberately picked for tea, like red clover.
It's very, very seasonal.
Just now there are greens like nettles, bittercress, ransoms, wild oniony things, a few leaf buds thinking about opening, primroses (look up peggles ) mallow leaves, bulbs from wild celandines (you did note where they grew last year, didn't you ?) and the usual pond roots like reedmace.
The other thing that's available are the sycamore peas. Bright fresh green and a neat wee juicy munchy

Every area is different though, and every season brings change

atb,
M

 

[Goatboy]

Hi Tony,

Good idea for a thread.

This last year has had me foraging quite a bit to put food on the table due to fiscal concerns. And It's not as easy as I thought when it matters. Especially when your knowledge isn't as good as it should be. Plus some stuff isn't that tasty of filling - as the 12 stone weight loss shows. Had good times with some gluts of apples, berries (wild raspberries and gooseberries mainly), herb Robert, rosebay, nettles and some steep learning on my fungi ident. Not a lot of filling tubers 'round here (and I try to stay out of the farmers tattie fields! as that's pinching) Have always known how to guddle trout which is handy but the local estate doesn't like us hitting the rabbit population as they fly the occasional raptor which is a great pity. The Jack Russell used to take the occasional rabbit and hare in his day but he's passed on now.
Foraging is great but hard work and you have to be cautious that you don't use more calories than you collect in Britains modern denuded countryside - especially if staying within the law which I always try to do. When I used to live on the coast near Crail I used to put out lobster creels and did well with them. I also used to forage the shore for seaweed, shrimps and molluscs. Much better pickings by the sea. Have always said that if I had to survive for real in the UK that's where I'd head - so much waiting to be picked up and easier to know what you can and cant eat.
Cheers,
GB.