Foraging

One of the most enjoyable things about foraging is the way in which it compels a greater awareness of one’s surroundings – the need to slow down, pause and look. My walk (run) to the station each morning plots a dishevelled and hastily coordinated line towards town – it’s only as the dust starts to settle in the evening and I make my way home that I spot what I’ve missed. Lime, sweet chestnut, ash, elder, common mallow, dandelion – last week I found clumps of wild fennel just a couple of hundred yards from our front door. Bit of a poor show that they’re marooned in a central reservation on the A331.

It goes without saying that a major aspect of foraging is identifying not just what to eat, but what to avoid. It’ll be a long while until I explore certain plants in the umbellifer family; wild chervil’s uncanny resemblance to a dangerous cousin is a little too close for comfort. There’d be few complaints from the family if I stirred a handful of finely chopped hemlock into a herby risotto, mostly due to the fact that we’d have expired at various points around the dining room. That said, spotting poisonous plants can provide clues to finding edible ones; foxgloves like soil with a higher PH, acidity loving sustenance may well be nearby.

Robin Harford runs a number of wild food courses in and around Sidmouth, East Devon (www.foragingcourses.com) – a great start if you’re keen on foraging. It was a revelation to discover that dried hogweed seeds have a lightly citrus, cardamom flavour; similarly I had no idea that German uniforms were woven from nettle fibre during World War 1. Nettles are a fantastically versatile plant, higher in vitamin C than oranges and packed full of protein. Why we use them so infrequently is something of a mystery.

Reedmace (bullrushes, as I erroneously knew them as a youth) is in flower about this time of year; slender spikes poking out of riverbanks and ponds with a fuzz of cottony pollen on top. When flour was rationed during the forties reedmace was regularly used as a substitute in bread making (roughly 20% pollen, 80% flour), apparently the roots are tasty too (not entirely dissimilar to hearts of palm). I could be onto a winner with the ‘hedgerow pizza’ – reedmace dough base, steamed nettle and ricotta topping with a scattering of mallow flowers at the end to add a bit of colour. Might work on an alternative title for the ‘Chocolate and hogweed torte’ though.

Posted on bbcgoodfood.com 26th July 2010

The heart of the matter

 I was ill-inclined to rekindle the ashes of what had been a brief and tempestuous relationship with the globe artichoke. Last year’s debacle - an event that quickly imploded into a spectacle of profanity and vegetable abuse, was blighted from the outset and resulted in an oversized thistle making a prompt, window facilitated exit from my life.

 Simple start this time: cut the stalk off, trim the top and boil for 35-45 minutes. After draining and resting the artichoke on a board I begin to peel off the outer scales - they fall away easily, my fingertips quickly pointing out that the inner layers remain hotter than the surface of the sun. A generous slab of butter over the steaming leaves prompts an unusual development - scraping the smooth, pulpy inside of a scale into the mouth with your teeth feels odd yet strangely satisfying. Still, not one to order on a first date. A recipe I’ve found in an old book enthuses the merits of chewing on the tough outer scales too, an opinion that upon reflection, seems misguided. They’re horrid. Spooning out the furry choke is the final step en route to the heart.

 “Is that it?” remarks a visibly disgruntled girlfriend, eyeing the heart suspiciously while offering a cusory glance at the heap of debris on the board. Nonplussed, I quarter the heart before adding a sprinkle of salt and few grinds of black pepper - it’s a brief but tasty affair.

 Having spent the best part of an hour unravelling its babushka doll exterior, I’ll concede that the resultant volume of ‘choke heart matter appears less than impressive. In its uncooked form an artichoke has a fantastic sculptural beauty; the aesthetic transition is the equivalent of arriving at the Albert Hall to find Dick Van Dyke on stage performing ‘The Planets’ solo on a nose flute. No actually, I’d pay good money to see that. Maybe it is worth the effort.

Posted on bbcgoodfood.com 24th April 2009