Wild Food Girl

Foraging the wild for plants and stuff to eat.

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Fun with Wild Waterleaf

May 1, 2015 By Erica M. Davis 2 Comments

Waterleaf is an interesting edible wild plant that does not get a lot of press in the wild food media. The local species I know is Fendler’s waterleaf (Hydrophyllum fendleri), a native perennial that grows from Colorado’s Front Range west, in damp to moist soil from 5,500 to … [Read more...]

Filed Under: April, edible, featured, May, useful info Tagged With: Colorado, Denver, foraging, greens, Hydrophyllum, Rocky Mountains, urban foraging, waterleaf

Don’t Forget the Tumble Mustard

April 22, 2015 By Erica M. Davis 2 Comments

If you’re looking to make use of local wild greens, why not give tumble mustard (Sisymbrium altissimum) a try? Tumble mustard—a non-native species from the Middle East thought to have been introduced to North America years ago via contaminated crop seed—is found throughout much … [Read more...]

Filed Under: April, edible, featured, high altitude, non-native, useful info Tagged With: foraging, mustard, plains, Rocky Mountains, tumble mustard, tumblemustard

Snowboarding, Nettles, & Jerusalem Artichoke Bouyah

April 17, 2015 By Erica M. Davis 1 Comment

My friend’s husband tells tales of growing up in northern Wisconsin next to the Menominee Nation, where as a boy he played with the kids on the reservation. When they got hungry, they’d head to whichever family’s house was hosting that week’s “bouyah," a Midwestern tradition … [Read more...]

Filed Under: edible, featured, high altitude, invasive Tagged With: Allium, Boletus edulis, Canada thistle, Colorado, Denver, foraging, invasive, jerusalem artichoke, mushroom, onion, porcini, recipes, Rocky Mountains, stinging nettles, urban foraging

A Fall for Thick, Rosy Hips

October 3, 2014 By Erica M. Davis 3 Comments

Legions of soft, plump, frost-kissed rosehips hang heavy upon their slender, prickly stems. Many are perfectly ripe, slipping off the ends of their branches with a soft, orange gush, leaving a sticky paste to be licked off the fingers. First I made rosehip sauce, by cooking … [Read more...]

Filed Under: edible, high altitude, useful info, Wild Edible Notebook Tagged With: berries, Colorado, Denver, foraging, recipes, Rocky Mountains, rose hips, rosehips, Wild Edible Notebook

Fruiting Forward

September 16, 2014 By Erica M. Davis 1 Comment

We went for wild plums in the cold, misty morning, gathering them with fingers freezing and lethargic, my feet squishing in icy, wet boots. It was worth enduring the thorny thicket, the musky scent of catnip tall around us, to come home with 20 lbs or so of plums, without making … [Read more...]

Filed Under: edible, useful info Tagged With: apples, Colorado, Denver, foraging, fruit, introduced, non-native, pears, plums, Rocky Mountains, urban foraging, wild plums

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Wild Food Girl

2 months ago

Wild Food Girl

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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Wild Food Girl

2 months ago

Wild Food Girl

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.
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Wild Food Girl

2 months ago

Wild Food Girl

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.
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Posts

  • The delicious ‘wild wonderberry’
  • Eating nodding thistle stalks
  • Spring is Japanese knotweed season
  • Best dandelion soup ever
  • Samuel Thayer’s new book ‘Incredible Wild Edibles’
  • Three pennycress mustard recipes
  • Forgotten rhubarb of the old west
  • Narrow dock in mushroom sauce
  • Eating chicory greens
  • Elm samaras are edible, gourmet
  • Hank Shaw’s Latest: A Cookbook for Deer, Elk, Antelope, Moose & More
  • Everything You Need to Know about Colorado Acorns
  • Land Caviar from Kochia Seeds
  • Fruity Sipping Vinegars from Repurposed Berry Mash
  • Wild Tarragon in the Weeds
  • Shasta Daisy & Dandelion Greens with Yucca Antipasto
  • A Tale of Four Daisies
  • Katrina Blair’s Wild Wisdom of Weeds
  • You’re My Candytuft
  • A Summer for Wintercress
  • A Patterns Method for Wild Food: Thomas Elpel’s Foraging the Mountain West
  • Fun with Wild Waterleaf
  • Don’t Forget the Tumble Mustard
  • Snowboarding, Nettles, & Jerusalem Artichoke Bouyah
  • Northeast Seaweed Farming & Foraging: A Chat with Charles Yarish
  • Sprouting Flour with Quinoa’s Wild Kin
  • Seaweeding the Eastern Shoreline
  • A Fall for Thick, Rosy Hips
  • Fruiting Forward
  • Dina Falconi’s Foraging & Feasting
  • Dad’s Creamy Wild Mushroom Soup
  • Lambs’ Quarters Pesto with Sunflower Seeds
  • Colorado High Country Blueberries are a Go
  • Eat Your Ornamentals: Backyard Foraging with Ellen Zachos
  • Hawks Wings Mushrooms – Free Download
  • Leaves of Three, Strawberry!
  • Wild Greens & Potato Pie with Kochia
  • Wilted Wild Greens with Lemon & Chive Flower
  • Tumbleweed Salad
  • Orache is a Wild Favorite
  • Wild Edible Picnic
  • Spring Cleaning with Fruit Leather
  • Florida Herbal Conference Starts February 28
  • Low Cost Meal—Beans & Dried Dock
  • Practical Herbs by Henriette Kress
  • Wild Edible Notebook—October release!
  • Stuffballs on the Menu
  • Old Places, New Head Spaces
  • Whistling Suillus
  • Antelope Liver Pâtés

Recipes

Best dandelion soup ever

Three pennycress mustard recipes

Shasta Daisy & Dandelion Greens with Yucca Antipasto

Dad’s Creamy Wild Mushroom Soup

Lambs’ Quarters Pesto with Sunflower Seeds

Archives

Comments

  • Erica M. Davis on Three pennycress mustard recipes
  • Erica M. Davis on Albatrellus Confluens Conference
  • Erica M. Davis on Eating chicory greens
  • tammie on Three pennycress mustard recipes
  • Making the Mushroom Anthotype Part III - Gavin Lyons Photography on Albatrellus Confluens Conference

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