currants | Wild Food Girl

Wild Black Currant Brandy Voted Best in House

January 28, 2012 By Erica M. Davis 4 Comments

It’s wild booze month at Hunger & Thirst and again I have Butterpoweredbike to thank for motivating me to the computer to write something. That—and for getting me into the liquor cabinet for a night of distraction from my many winter obligations. Fortunately, Gregg and I … [Read more...]

There’s No Foraging Like Snow Foraging

October 19, 2011 By Erica M. Davis 5 Comments

It’s mid October and it just keeps snowing here in the high country at 11,000 feet in Colorado Rockies. You’d think foraging season were over, but it’s not. Two days ago I awoke to a steady snow and found myself unable to focus on work. By noon it stopped but the wind kicked … [Read more...]

The Current Currant Season is Kicking

August 26, 2011 By Erica M. Davis 6 Comments

The currants and gooseberries were not yet ripe here at 11,000 feet in the Colorado Rockies when I published my August Wild Edible Notebook, which is devoted to berries—strawberries and huckleberries, specifically—but now they are, and oh what a currant season the current season … [Read more...]

Tale of a Golden Foraging Opportunity

July 22, 2011 By Erica M. Davis 3 Comments

On our way home from Denver last Friday, Gregg and I made a detour up Golden Gate Canyon Road to check out a 93-acre ranch that Marilyn, who I met when she commented on a post, invited us to forage. (Actually, truth be told, I invited myself and she was generous enough to … [Read more...]

Fall Foraging in the Colorado High Country

September 26, 2010 By Erica M. Davis Leave a Comment

We had a great hike on Pennsylvania Mountain near our house in the Colorado high country yesterday afternoon. My intention was just to go for a short jaunt because we both have non-wild-edible-plants-related work to get done. So we headed up to one of our usual spots—an old … [Read more...]

2 months ago

Another edible plant I found on my road trip through Utah was red barberry (Berberis haematocarpa syn. Mahonia haematocarpa). It has holly-like, tough leaves with spines on the points—features I am most familiar with in the related, low-growing Oregon grape (Mahonia repens), whose tart, powder-blue berries I enjoy. But this high-desert-loving red barberry is a shrub bearing big, sweet/tart, fruity red berries. It was growing on a dry hilltop amidst pinyon pines (Pinus edulis) and juniper, where it stood out because of all the fruit it bore. I gathered a small sample to study and nibble, but I look forward to collecting enough for a jam or jelly next time I make this lovely plant’s acquaintance! ... See MoreSee Less

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2 months ago

I took myself on a solo road trip to Nevada last week, and I’m so happy I did! I have been studying pinyon pines, primarily our local two-needle pinyon (Pinus edulis), but I wanted to check out the singleleaf pinyons (P. monophylla) of the Great Basin too. They are having a mast year there, so the trees and ground were covered with pinyon nuts of many colors, shapes, and sizes. Even better, when I pulled into the campground I met a nice Navajo couple up from Arizona to do the same, so we camped and harvested pinyons together for a couple days.

It is a Navajo belief that if you shake the trees, early winter will come—so we just gathered from the ground, talking and telling stories to pass the time. I am embarrassed to say it took some work to keep up with my new 65 and 70-year-old friends, who could go for 6 hours straight. But I learned so much—how they winnowed out the blanks, and roasted and salted pinyon nuts to perfection, not to mention other things like how various other plants are used for medicine, food, and utility, and how to make ash bread and fry bread and nixtamalize corn with juniper ash.

I am counting my blessings for such a wonderful and unexpected experience with new friends—and of course, all the pinyones I’m stuffing my face with right now. ... See MoreSee Less

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2 months ago

Here is a neat plant I found for the first time on my cross-country trip last week—purple poppy mallow (Callirhoe involucrata). I first read about this plant in Kelly Kindscher’s book, Edible Wild Plants of the Prairie. Then Sam Thayer chose it to grace the cover of his latest book, Incredible Wild Edibles (2017), and of course included a very useful account.

This relative of common mallow (Malva neglecta) is also low-growing with leaves that are similarly structured, but more deeply lobed. It is also known as “prairie winecups” for its pretty flowers, which I was glad to find too.The green parts and flowers are edible, as is the taproot. Sadly, I didn’t find a place to dig any purple poppy mallow on my trip. The first place I found it had only a couple specimens, and this native perennial should only be dug where there is a healthy population, preferable one that needs thinning, Sam writes. The second spot had a decent-sized population in the mowed grass along an Arby’s parking lot, but I didn’t think Arby’s would love it if I dug up their lawn. So, next time!

Sam shows eastern Colorado as the starting point (headed east) for this Great Plains species, but I didn’t find any in Colorado. The two populations I found were in central Nebraska. These are often cultivated as landscaping plants too. ... See MoreSee Less

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