Springtime always has me wild again - wild for life, wild for love, wild for plants. As an herbalist, I take great delight in the green world coming into full force all around me. For me, medicine-making time begins anew as well time for wild culinary delights. There is little that is so tasty and fufilling as wild meals, and even small amounts of wild plant and animal foods added to meals helps satisfiy my soul and nourish my need to be to remain essentially untamed. Higher in nutrient density & fiber, free from ridiculously wasteful packaging or xenoestrogen-packed nasty pollutants (depending upon where you harvest! - use care and knowledge) wild food serves a welcome role in my diet as it has for most human beings since the dawn of time. It connects me with my self reliant ancestors, the evolutionary survivors whose blood now runs through my body. It also connects me to the land I live on and helps keep me wild. After a long winter, these digestive supporting, blood cleansing spring tonics have a natural role as health enhancing.
My first wild meal this year included dandelion greens (before flowering - or else too bitter for me) and nettle tops (harevsted carefully) sautéd in butter. YUM! Ive also enjoyed burdock root - boiled first before stiring up; chickweed, violets & garlic mustard with greens in salad; wild smoked turkey (a gift from a hunter neighbor) as well as wild duck and bluegill from the Chesapeake (a gift from a nearby waterman). I also love poke salat, fiddleheads with morels, and copious amounts of lamb's quaters steamed and otherwise cooked like spinach. There are others to consider as well - sorrell, watercress, ramps, and later in the year elderberries, acorns, persimmons, and so many other delightful, medicinal, and free foods.
“Let thy food be thy medicine and thy medicine be thy food.” --Hippocrates (460-377 B.C.)
My first wild meal this year included dandelion greens (before flowering - or else too bitter for me) and nettle tops (harevsted carefully) sautéd in butter. YUM! Ive also enjoyed burdock root - boiled first before stiring up; chickweed, violets & garlic mustard with greens in salad; wild smoked turkey (a gift from a hunter neighbor) as well as wild duck and bluegill from the Chesapeake (a gift from a nearby waterman). I also love poke salat, fiddleheads with morels, and copious amounts of lamb's quaters steamed and otherwise cooked like spinach. There are others to consider as well - sorrell, watercress, ramps, and later in the year elderberries, acorns, persimmons, and so many other delightful, medicinal, and free foods.
“Let thy food be thy medicine and thy medicine be thy food.” --Hippocrates (460-377 B.C.)
Wild
Occurring, growing, or thriving in a natural state; not domesticated, cultivated, or tamed. Lacking supervision or restraint. Disorderly; unruly. Not submitting to discipline or control.
Recipes Online
http://www.umext.maine.edu/onlinepubs/htmpubs/4060.htm
http://www.wild-harvest.com/pages/chefperkey.htm
http://www.bobcatswilderkitchen.com/kitchen.html
Why eat wild food?
http://www.self-reliance.net/wewf.html
http://www.redmoonherbs.com/articles/nettle.php
BooksThe Forager's Harvest: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Edible Wild Plants by Samuel Thayer Feasting Free on Wild Edibles by Bradford Angier
