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Archives 2011 (June to December)
French being my native language, I apologize in advance for my "interesting" grammar.
Wild Food Foraging Hike and Wild Food Sampling.
December 2011
Just came back from our my wild food class. It was an interesting experience to say the least, we had extremely high winds in the last week and my usual foraging ground was a disaster zone. Most of the black nighshade berries are gone, cattail was unedible (too dry) and curly dock was also getting too old. But, in the same time we had a lot of wonderful yummy greens such as neetle and chickweeds.
We went on a hike for an hour and collected a bunch of chickweeds and nettle. We probably looked at 20 edible plants. After the class we had our usual wild food feast with various pickled wild food I made over the year (wild radish pods, acorns, yucca, etc...) but we also made some fresh nettle pesto, a nice chickweed salad and cooked some eggs with nettles. Of course we also had some wild plant beers. Overall it was a great day!
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Oxalis / Wood Sorrel
November 2011
You can find oxalis pretty much anywhere; in your garden, in the woods or even sidewalk cracks. I recognize it immediatly with the 3 heart shaped leaves and small black dots here and there. The taste is a bit like lemon/vinegar, definitly sour.
Oxalis is a wonderful addition to wild food salads or soups. You can even curdle cheese with it instead of using lemon juice or vinegar.
The plant contains oxalic acid which In very large amounts (such as juicing it and drinking it over a long period of time) may be considered toxic and interfering with kidney function. Note that oxalic acid is also present in common foods such as spinach, broccoli, brussel sprouts, grapefruit and chive among many others sooooo.,.splurge in it!
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Gourmet Wild Food Class (Transitional Gastronomy)
November 2011
Last Sunday we had our last wild food gastronomy class for the month and also for the year. During the first part of the class, we went on a foraging hike and looked at various edible plants. After the recent rain, it's the perfect time to forage chickweeds and nettles but where we were foraging, it was also a good opportunity to collect nightshade berries, curly dock, cattail, mugwort and much more!
While we were foraging, Mia prepared us a wild food feast with the edible plants we collected the day before and some wild food preserves I've made over the year. Mia's dishes consisted of griddled white polenta cakes with a curly dock/lambsquarter "gravy" and nightshade and red wine redux drizzle and fresh mini donuts with wild currant preserves and homemade lemon zest whipped cream. YUM!
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It's Horehound Time!
November 2011
Horehound is an herb related to mint. In fact horehound share on of the caracteristics of the mint family with it's square stem. Horehound used to be esteemed in cook and medicine, but now almost out of use except for making candy which is still used to relieve tickling in the throat due to coughing.
It's an extremely bitter plant so use it sparingly when you make candy or an infusion. (see January 2011 for the recipe)
This time I collected a bunch to make something new...BEER! Yup, horehound has been used in antiquity to make beer, which kind of makes sense with the natural bitterness of the plant. So I'll post on that very soon. |
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Master Food Preservers - Graduation!
November 2011
Well, I did it! After 3 months of attending weekly classes, I've graduated as a Master Food Preserver.
As I said earlier, I've learned a bunch of new things, including modern methods of preserving meat and in general I've now able to fine tune my food preservation methods to be as safe as possible.
I also have a lot of new projects now such as making cheese, my own vinegar, dry sausages and much more. Of course, I'm also going to apply a lot of what I have learned to wild food as well.
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Wild Food Foraging and Sampling Class
November 2011
This sunday we went on a hike to collect a bunch of wild edible plants. It was the perfect time to collect western black nightshade berries but also some curly dock, young thistles, mugwort and chickweeds.
The hike was around an hour.
After the walk, we tasted some of the wild food I had previously prepared such as Wild Radish in a Thai fish sauce, pickled foraged olives and black walnuts with hummus.
We also tasted some of the mugwort beer I made last month.
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Springs is Early in Southern California!
November 2011
I love Southern California. You get a little bit of rain and immediatly the plants starts growing. It's November and in some location it feels like springs. We have tons of young shoots (Mallow, Nettles, Chickweed, Thistle and more) which makes wonderful wild food salads.
So today, I made a delicious salad with chickweed, young thistle leaves and wild radish sprouts. You can't buy that much taste and freshness at the store!!!!!!!
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Time Magazine feature Urban Outdoor Skills
and Transitional Gastronomy.
November 2011
We just had a nice little feature in the food section of TIME Magazine about what were doing with wild food and transitional gastronomy. Here are some excerpts of the article:
"Mia Wasilevich and Pascal Baudar lead foraging classes throughout the city...
...They also just launched a wild-foodie site, TransitionalGastronomy.com, that includes such dishes as cattail tempura and black-nightshade ketchup.
For Dessert? Mugwort-ale ice cream. "
So check out our new site (still very incomplete though) featuring some of the wild food cuisine that Mia and myself are doing!
www.TransitionalGastronomy.com |
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Master Food Preservers - Graduating soon!
November 2011
About 3 months ago I was approved to attend the Master Food Preservation program which is part of UCLA Extension Program.
Basically A Master Food Preserver is a person who is educated in food preservation and is certified by a university agricultural extension. This person is qualified to not just use his or her knowledge to preserve food, but also to disseminate that knowledge to others, via lectures, talks, and one-on-one instruction.
I've been attending classes weekly and although I had previous knowledge of food safety and food preservation, I've learned quite a lot of new things. So far we've had classes on making cheese and yoghurt, fermentation, high pressure canning, charcuterie, salting, water bath canning, pickling, making your own vinegar, preserving in alcohol and more.
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Wild Food Kimchi of the Month
October 2011
At least once a month I make some wild food kimchi. Usually I do it for the classes I give during the weekend. It's a neat way to introduce people to some of the unusual dishes you can make with edible plants and in the same time educate them to an old method of preserving food and let's face it, although fermenting is widely used all over the world, most Americans are not very familiar with fermenting food.
This month I made some wild food kimchi with Curly Dock, Lambsquarters, Dandelion and Watercress. |
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Making Traditional Goat Cheese and Yoghurt Class
October 2011
As part of the Master Food Preserves program, I attended a cheese class this week.
I've already made "wild food" cheeses in the past which were really just some simple farmer cheeses with a limited shelf life (usually you eat the cheese within a few days) so it was really interesting to learn how to make cheese using renet.
I can see myself making some nice aged cheese in the near future using wild plants and beers.
During the second part of the class we also learned how to make you own yoghurt. So simple and probably one of the oldest way of preserving milk.
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Wild Food Sausages? Yup...Acorn Sausages!
October 2011
Well, I could not wait to get started with the new sausage maker we just purchased - I just HAD to make some sausages. I remember that last year Mia made an awesome vegetarian burger with the acorns we foraged so we had a "meeting" and got to work on making some vegetarian sausages using acorns as one of the main ingredients.
We ended up doing two different recipes (will post soon) and we're still fine tuning the second recipe but we're extremely happy with the result! |
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Making Salt with Purple Monkey Flower - NOT!
(Mimulus cardinalis)
October 2011
During my foraging hikes, I encounter a lot of Purple Monkey Flowers. I know they're edible but I've not done anything with them yet. Mostly because the few times I tasted the plant, it was just "blah" - nothing outstanding about the taste. Doing some research online I found the following statement from Wikipedia and other sources: " Mimulus species tend to concentrate sodium chloride and other salts absorbed from the soils in which they grow in their leaves and stem tissues. Native Americans and early travelers in the American West used this plant as a salt substitute to flavor wild game."
Well, of course I had to try it so I dehydrated the leaves and stem tissues, made a fine powder with it and was all excited about having this new natural source of salt!
I tasted a little pinch of it and guess what...Blah again! Nothing exciting or salty about the taste. So I guess my local Mimulus does do a good job concentrating sodium chloride from the soil. I'll try harvesting from a different location to make sure before filing it into my failed experiments folder.
BTW...WIkipedia is NOT a reliable source of information for wild food education, I've encountered several errors in the past.
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Thai-Style Pickled California Bay Fruits.
October 2011
Wow! This was a challenge. I don't think I've ever done so many experiments with an edible plant before. As explained below the original taste was...well...unexpected but I was determined to make something good with it. and I used my whole arsenal of knowledge...salting, dehydrating, fermenting, boiling, making various pickling recipes and even frying the damn things!
BUT I DID IT!!!!!!! I came out with something that taste somewhat agreable as a condiment. The traditional pickling (vinegar) didn't work at all but this recipe is a winner:
Ingredients: 3/4 cup lime juice, 1/4 cup white vinegar, 1/2 cup water, 3 tablespoon canne sugar and (not a must) 1 tablespoon fish sauce. Each jar (4 Ounces) contained a small dry chili, 1/2 garlic clove and some ginger (same size as a regular garlic clove) and of course the bay fruits (pits removed). .
Boil the ingredients (lime, vinegar, sugar and fish sauce) and pour it in the jar (with bay fruits, garlic, etc...). Process for 15 mins using the water bath canning method, let it age for at least 3 weeks and enjoy. It's really nice used sparingly in wild food salads.
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Foraging California Bay Fruits
October 2011
Well, I came back to the place where I saw the bay fruits and they were perfectly ripe! I was very excited and could not wait to bite one and taste it. Somehow looking at the color I was expecting something very fruity but my bite was rewarded by some sort of avocado-like mush with a strong taste of Bay leave. As we say in French: "Beurk!" on in the US: "Yuck!".
BUT....despite my sad experience, I still got excited by the zing of the fruits. Definitely something you can use in dishes if you can tone down the flavors. Doing some research the natives used to dry the fruits before snacking on them (they also roasted the seeds to make a chocolate-like drink).
So I dehydrated the fruits and it's still "Yuck" so now I'm bringing the whole arsenal to make them palatable. Boiling, Pickling, Fermenting, Mixing and much more....here I come!
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Traditional Food Preservation Techniques,
Salting and Drying Meat - Making Duck Prosciutto
October 2011
I LOVE Prosciutto but I'm not too happy with the prosciutto you find in the regular stores (Whole Foods has some good imported one though) so I decided to make my own. Making Prosciutto is very simple - you just need salt and cold dehydration. If I was in a colder climate (usually around 50 degrees) I could hang my prosciutto to dry in an attic or basement but living in Southern California I can't do it but guess what...you CAN use your fridge to do it. So here is the recipe:
- Purchase a Duck Breast (or more). Take a pan and pour salt in it, place the duck breast on it and cover it with salt (if you use more than one breast make sure they don't touch each other). You can use sea salt or kosher salt but not regular salt (contains iodine).
- Cover the pan with plastic wrap and place in the fridge for 24 hrs.
- Remove the duck breast from the salt, rinse it with water and pat dry with a paper towel. Wrap the breast in cheesecloth and tie it with a string.
- WEIGHT the breast at this point as it will be ready when 30% of its weight will be lost through drying. After weighting it, hang it in a section of the fridge (don't let it touch anything) and simply wait until 30% of the weight is gone. It took around 10 days for my prosciutto to be ready and it tasted as good as an imported Italian prosciutto.
- When 30% of the weight is gone, remove from the fridge, unwrap the cheesecloth and enjoy!!!!
You can wrap it in platic wrap and store it in the fridge for a week or two but you can also refrigerate it and it will be good for at least a couple of months. |
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New Purchase - Manual Sausage Maker
October 2011
Sausages here I come!!!!!
I've wanted to make all kind of sausages from a while and I finally decided to purchase a good manual sausage maker. I decided to go for a top of the line one so it's stainless steel (won't rust) and will last for more then one lifetime (you can still use it when you come back so it's a good investment). The cost is around $120.00 and has the attachements to stuff the sausage.
It's the same company where I bought my stainless steel dehydrator. The name of the company is simple: The Sausage Maker (or TSM) and you can access their web site here.
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Traditional Food Preservation Techniques,
Wild Food Foraging and Sampling.
October 2011
This Sunday I gave a class on some traditional food preservation techniques. I demonstrated how to pickle and also how to preserve food using salt. After the demonstration, we went on a foraging hike for an hour, collected a few plants such as Lambsquarters, Curly Dock, Black Nighshade Berries and much more.
At the end of the class we had a wild food sampling, Mia made some donuts with elderberry jam and homemade chips with nighshade ketchup. We also had purslane salsa, pickled yucca shoot and California green walnuts, foraged mission olives (greek style and fermented), pickled wild radish pods in a Thai sauce, pickled yucca buds and a few more things.
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Western Black Nightshade Ketchup
October 2011
Mia made an interesting ketchup using the ripe nightshade berries.
As many of you know, the nighshade berries are from the same family as the tomato and the flavor profile is similar to a grape or cherry tomato. Very fruity - a bit tart and sweet. She used some traditional ketchup flavors like cloves and brown sugar and molasses, but added a new twist with corriander, fennel and wild California bay leaves.
It's a new staple in our house.
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Foraging Western Black Nightshade Berries
October 2011
It's the perfect time to forage nightshade berries right now. Although some books will tell you the contrary, the berries of the Western Black Nightshade are perfectly edible when they are ripe. You don't want to eat the unripe (green) berries though as they would still have toxicity.
The rest of the plant is also not edible but the leaves can be used as an anaesthetic on a wound by simply making a poultice.
There are many uses for the berries, you can make salsa, sauces, raw in wild food salads, dehydrate them, etc... your imagination is really the limit. Think of them as small tomatoes.
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Transitional Gastronomy - Gourmet Wild Food Class
September 2011
This morning we had our wild food gourmet class. Around 15 people attended our class. During the first part of the class we went on a foraging walk and collected various wild food. After the walk we had an incredible wild feast with food that Mia and myself has prepared the day before.
On the menu we had: wafer thin potato chips with homemade nightshade ketchup, wild food papadams and purslane salsa, fresh nettle pasta and nightshade marinara...and cattail pollen madeleines and wild sage beer caramel corn!
We also had tons of pickled wild food such as walnuts, acorns, yucca, wild radish and much more! |
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Curly Dock.
September 2011
We have a lot of beautiful Curly Dock right now. The leaves can be eaten raw or cooked and have a definite tart/vinegar taste. The large leaves are perfect to make wraps (we make sushi wraps with them).
The plant has more vitamin C than oranges and more vitamin A than carrots. I also use the seeds to make crackers (see below).
If you decide to cook this plant I would advise to balance it with something that is a bit sweet like onions. In fact a simple survival dish made of Curly Dock, Onions and Garlic is quite good. Add some parmesan and bacon and you have something really delicious.
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Basic Trapping and Wild Food Class
September 2011
This Sunday I gave a class on basic trapping and wild edibles. I showed some traps that are easy to make and quite effective for food procurement. They also require a minimum of tools. We made a bird trap Arapuca-style, deadfall traps with Premontory pegs, etc...
After going over the traps we went on a wild food hike to look at the local food available in mid-september. We found Lambsquarters, Curly Dock, Nettles and even some wild radish and mustard.
At the end of the class we had some wild food samplings with hummus (pickled walnuts, yucca, wild radish pods, etc...) and also made some basic dishes with Lambsquarters such as Pesto and cooked "survival style" with garlic and parmesan. |
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Free Brewing Yeast
September 2011
I went to my usual brewing supplies store last week and guess what! The price of yeast has increased by 50%!!!!!!!!!!
A small pack of Yeast used to cost $2.50 and now it's $5.00. I know the economy is pretty bad right now but come-on! a 50% increase!!!!!!
I refuse to pay that much so I'm learning to make my own yeast and find way to re-use the yeast I previously purchased. This means I'm going to make some interesting experiments with brewing beers using wild yeast. By the way, my "green/white" elderberry wine using wild yeast was a success and I bottled one gallon this weekend. It's still very sugary but I know I can make some wonderful cocktails with the wine as a base.
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Foraging California Black Walnuts
September 2011
I checked on some of the local walnuts trees this weekend and already foraged a few. In a week or two, it will be time to collect a bunch of native California walnuts.
The California Black Walnuts(Juglans Californica) were foraged and eaten by the natives indians (chumash), the main problem is the fact that the shells are really thick and it's nearly impossible to remove properly the edible parts inside.
My method of eating them is simply to use a large stone, crush the walnuts and remove what's edible inside. It's quite crumbled but it makes a nice addition to wild food salads or "wild" trail mixes. |
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Cattail Pollen Madeleines Cookies
September 2011
I collected a bunch of cattail pollen on Friday. It's a bit unusual to forage it in September but I went to a location whch was flooded for many months and the cattail started to grow 3 months later when the lake dried.
Sorry about the face, pollen was everywhere. After an hour of foraging, I was completely covered with yellow powder. The best method for foraging Cattail pollen is to bend the top of the spike and cover it with a plastic bag, shake the stem vigorously and voila! Cattail pollen is nutritious and can be used as a flour substitute.
Mia immediatly saw the potential and made some really delicious madeleines cookies using a ratio of about 1/2 pollen and 1/2 flour. They're so bright and beautiful! Delicious too!
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Foraging (more) Manzanita Berries
September 2011
Most of the Manzanita berries in my area are quite big, sticky and have a large seeds so it's difficult to make Manzanita cider with them. After consulting with my friend Christopher Nyerges, he advised me to go to higher altitude so we made a trip to the local mountains and found tons of the smaller berries (a different variety). They're mostly pulp and not sticky so it's much easier to work with.
To make a basic Manzanita cider, I simply make sure the berries are completely dry ( I placed them in the sun for 3-4 days). I used my molcajete to grind them to a powder (you need to remove the seeds which are very hard), mixed the powder with water and voila! A delicious and refreshing drink indeed. You can also make cider with the green berries but that will be the subject of another post. |
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Trip to the Mountains
September 2011
This weekend I drove to the mountains to forage Manzanita Berries and explore a bit to find out what kind of edible plants I can find at higher elevations.
Honestly, it's a good reminder that you must never cease to learn. I found a lot of new plants which I have no clue as to their edibility or other uses (medicinal, etc...). We found some interesting lichens, various sages and the perfect locations to forage for acorns in a few months. We also found some braken ferns (didn't know we have those in the Los Angeles area).
I'll probably be back in a couple of weeks to forage more Manzanita berries.
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Wild Food Seeds/Flour Crackers
(Curly Dock, Lambsquarters, Buckwheat)
September 2011
I like to create dishes that stay as close to the wild food as possible. Last month I made some Purslane salsa so I thought it would be perfect to make crackers with the seeds I collected. I also wanted to keep it a bit “primitive”.
My concept was to create some sort of Indian papadum, a bit rough on the edges but quite tasty. To make the crackers, I used lambsquarters, curly dock and buckwheat seeds and made a fine flour with it. Mixed it with regular flour (ratio of 1 to 1), added a bit of Parmesan for taste. On top of it I brushed some olive oil, added some garlic powder, black mustard seeds (foraged) and spices from the garden. 10 minutes in the oven and voila! The perfect “primitive” companion for my wild food salsa. |
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Seeds Time! Foraging for Seeds
September 2011
I used to think of fall as some sort of "downtime" for foraging in Southern California until a couple of years ago I started to explore the seeds bounty that nature was offering me.
Yesterday I went on a foraging trip and collected a bunch of various seeds such as Lambsquarters seeds, Curly Dock seeds and Wild Buckwheat. I was also looking for Amaranth seeds but could not find any as the area where they usually grow was mowed down by city workers to remove the "weeds".
Nevertheless I came back with 3 bags full of seeds, not bad for a couple of foraging hours!
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Gourmet Wild Food Class
August 2011
This weekend we had our gourmet wild food class and we went all out on making some wonderful dishes for those who attended the class. On the first part of the class, we went on a foraging walk to learn about local edible plants. At the end of the walk, we came back to "the camp" to taste some wonderful wild foods that Mia and myself had prepared.
On the menu we had: Wild Food Sushi (fermented wild food in Curly Dock wrap) with a green sauce (various wild edible plants), Mugwort Beer Pretzels, around 10 wild edible condiments to go with our homemade hummus (pickled acorns, wild food kimchi, wild radish pods in Thai sauce, pickled walnuts and much more). We also had Purslane salsa and sampled some mugwort and white sage beer made with local plants. A real feast! |
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Foraging Manzanita Berries
August 2011
This weekend I drove to the mountains to forage Manzanita Berries. The name Manzanita means "small apple" which should tell you why I forage these berries. The shrubs are quite easy to recognize with their dark red bark. In late summer, the berries are all dried up and it's the right time to pick them up!
Back at home, I crush the berries, remove the seeds and using my molcajete (you can use an electric coffee grinder is you want to go faster), I grind the berries into a fine powder. There are many uses for the powder. The most simple use is to mix it with water and you get a very refreshing drink with an apple-cider taste. From a culinary perspective, you can add it to sauces, bread and cookies as well.
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Purslane Salsa
August 2011
I made this Salsa last weekend with the Purslane I foraged near Pasadena. The recipe is very simple:
4 cups chopped tomatoes
5 cups chopped foraged purslane
1 1/2 cups chopped onions
6 garlic cloves
2 cups apple cider vinegar
1/2 cup sugar
3 California Bay Leaves
1 cup of Cilantro and some spices from the garden (Thyme, etc...). Add salt and pepper to taster.
Boil then simmer until the right consistency, add the cilantro at the end. You can safely can/jar this recipe using the water-bath method. |
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Mugwort Beer
Artemisia vulgaris (mugwort or common wormwood)
August 2011
This is the second beer I made. The name of the plant should tell you it has been used for making beer. Everybody know what a mug is and "Wort" is what you call the sugar/herbs solution you use to make beer - wort also used to mean “Herb” so Mugwort is an “mug herb”. Mugwort has been used for many centuries to flavor beer. This mugwort beer was made following a medieval recipe, at the time each household was making its own beer using local plants. Just need molasse, brown sugar, mugwort (foraged locally) and some beer yeast. The beer has a very pleasant bitterness and from my friends feedback, this is so far the favorite wild plants beer.
Mugwort is also a plant of many uses - antiseptic, aromatic and even magical. It's a relative of wormwood (used to make Absynthe in the old days).
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White Sage Beer
August 2011
Well, after attending some beer classes, studying a couple of books on making primitive beers and some research online...ta-dah!!!!!!!
I made my first beer with wild plants!
It's an adaptation of a 500 years old recipe for wild plants beer. In this case I used White Sage. I had to adapt the recipe to fit the flavor of the local white sage and I'm delighted by the result. This is the kind of beer your ancestors were drinking in Europe. I used brown sugar, white sage (foraged locally) and limes. The original recipe asked for garden sage and lemons. The choice of using limes was perfect with the wilder taste of the white sage. As with the mugwort sage (above) I still have to do a bit of work to improve the carbonation (making it fizzy) but I think I know how to improve it and will do so in the next batch. |
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Making Wild Food Sushi
August 2011
For the class we made this interesting little dish, wild food sushi!
Well, it's not really a sushi, more like a wild California roll. Instead of fish we used some wild food kimchi (Curly Dock, Lambsquarters, Amaranth, Cabbidge, etc..) with some rice and wrapped the whole thing using some Curly Dock leaves.
To make the wrap with the Curly Dock, you simply need to blanch the leaves for a few seconds in boiling water.You get a nice soft leaf ready to be used. Place the rice and kimchi inside, roll it , cut it and voila!
Mia made an awesome sauce with a base of wild currant and soy. It was a big hit at our wild food class this morning.
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Wild Food Foraging Class
August 2011
Just had my wild food foraging class this morning. Around 16 people attended the class. We went for a small foraging hike to identify some plants. We found some Curly Dock, Wild Radish Pods, Wild Mustard, Nutgrass, Lambsquarter, Passion Fruits and much more!
Mia also started a new concept of creating an outdoor "pop-up" culinary experience, for the first time we made a whole meal starting with appetizers, a main dish and dessert. The appetizer was composed of various pickled and fermented wild food (Acorns, Walnuts, Radish Pods, etc...) with hummus, corn chips and purslane salsa. We also had some wild food sushi (Wild food kimchi with rice wrapped in curly dock leaves), Curly Dock bread pudding with a goat creme/lambsquarter sauce and some Elderberry tarts with wild currant sauce. The setup was quite professional and a nice surprise for those who attended the class. A winning concept for sure! |
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Attending a Beer-Making Class
August 2011
Oh yes! I have something up my sleeve and I'll post about it soon. I did some beer with honey a couple of years ago (Called Mead) but I've become very interested about making beers using wild foraged plants. I've done tons of research on primitive beers and wild plants and I started to do a couple of batches using aromatic and medicinal plants.
To make my education a bit more complete, I attended a modern beer class. It's really the same principle as primitive beers aside from the fact that domesticated yeasts are used and the process is made more complicated (adding yeast nutrients, chemicals to kill wild yeasts, etc...) to ensure success and a specific standard (ale, lager, etc...).
Factually making beer is very, VERY simple and requires very few ingredients which you can find easily at your local store and, of course, the wilderness. So stay tuned for more!
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Transitional Gastronomy
Floating Island (Ile flottante) With Passion Fruits
August 2011
Mia made this really cook dish last weekend with the passion fruits we collected. A floating island is a French dessert consisting of meringues floating on creme Anglaise. Mia gave it a little wild food twist by using a creme Anglaise flavored with the Passion Fruit juice and puree. The meringue was made using our own chicken eggs.
Tasted as good as it looks, just delicious!
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Wild Passion Fruits (Passiflora Incarnata)
August 2011
Mid August is the perfect time to collect (native) wild passion fruits. This fleshy fruit is an oval berry about the size of a hen egg.
After the spectacular flowering stage, the fruits are green at first, but then becomes orange as it matures. The fruits grown on vines and you can find wild passion fruits in many urban areas, even on the sides of Los Angeles freeways.
IThey're very easy to eat, simply slice them open and you can eat the sweet pulp/seeds inside. I've made wild passion jam with honey (50/50) which lasted for months in my refrigerator. They are also a wonderful snack while hiking.
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Making Curly Dock Bread
August 2011
Mia made some bread yesterday with the Curly Dock seeds that we foraged. We had to do a bit of research because picking the tiny seeds from their shell would take forever so we simply did what everyone else seems to be doing - just pick up the seeds/shells from the stalk, clean the whole thing in water, dehydrate it (Oven, sun or dehydrator) and grind it. No need to go crazy trying to extract the seeds from their shells. We used a coffee grinder and in no times had 2 cups of Curly Dock flour.
The bread was a mix of 50 percent regular flour and 50 percent Curly Dock flour. It's really tasty, similar to what we call in Belgium a "Pain Gris" ("Pain gris" is a bread made with an unrefined type of flour which gives the bread a grayish color ). So factually, from a self-reliance viewpoint you could save your precious flour and make twice the amount of bread by using this mix.
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Foraging Curly Dock Seeds
August 2011
Went to my regular foraging hiking ground near Pasadena and we have tons of Curly Dock going to seeds. I know that the seeds are completely edible but I've never tried it so this is one of our project for this weekend.
Not sure how we are going to extract the seeds from their shells (see photo), I've tried it and it's really time consumming so I'll do some research on how to deal with this "problem".
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Making Elderberry Wine with Wild Yeasts the Correct Way...
August 2011
My first attempt to make elderberry wine with wild yeast was a failure but I found the reason it didn't work correctly. My new batch is doing awesome so here is the proper way to do it:
1. Make sure you clean thoroughly your hands and everything you're using to make the wine.
2. Take around 4 cups of berries and crust them with your hands or colander to make a puree, do not get rid of anything, the yeast is mostly on the skin. Do not boil it, it would kill the yeast.
3. Using a juicer, make around 6 cups of pure juice, add to it 4 cups of sugar. I don't boil that juice either. Place everything (Puree and juice) in a container (glass or food grade plastic). Cover it with a clean towel (I usually fold it in two). Leave it for a few days until you get a thick green bubbling goo on top. Do not worry (be happy), it means the yeast is working fine. In Southern California, because of high temperature, it only took me 3-4 days for the mixture to be ready.
4. Boil 4 cups of water, add 6-8 cups of (organic) white sugar, mix and let it cool. Once lukewarm add it to the elderberry juice/puree in the container. Leave it for a few hours.
5. Syphon the liquid (below the green bubbling goo) into a clean 1 gallon bottle and attach airlock (available online or in wine supplies stores - see photo on top of the bottle). .
6. Wait until it stops bubbling (can be 2-3 months). I'll update this blog for the next steps at the appropriate time. |
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Cooking Using Free Energy:
Solar Beef Stew
August 2011
I think in the last two months, we've only spent $26.00 on energy cost for cooking and as you can see on this web site, we cook A LOT! On way we achieve it is by managing to do it without being "on the grid". We do all our gourmet cooking on a simple gas stove connected to a small propane tank (That's the $26.00 cost) and whenever appropriate, we also use the solar oven.
Living in California, we're pretty lucky to have sun pretty much all year long. Today, I made some beef stew with a mix of wild and conventional food (some from the garden too). It was a nice hot day and the temperature in the over reached over 340 degrees!
I can have the stew cooking all day long for free and for dinner we'll have some nice, tender and juicy beef stew. Yum!
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Foraging California Bay Leaves
July 2011
I use bay leaves all the time for my canning and cooking so why not getting it for free?
I ran out of California Bay Leaves a couple of weeks ago and despite looking for some in my foraging trips, I always came up empty ended. Finally, last weekend I found several trees in the local mountains. I came back with a couple of bags and the next day they were dehydrated. I should have enough for the rest of the year. The California Bay Leaves are, in my opinion, more flavorful than the usual bay leaves you buy at the store. Use it sparingly though! if a dish call for 3 bay leaves, only use one California Bay leaf. The fruits are also edible and late August it is usually the season to collect them (they turn purple). Never tried the fruits though so I'll be back to visit the trees. |
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Transitional Gastronomy
Elderberry Hand Pies
July 2011
Mia made this wonderful dish with the elderberries that we foraged.
The elderberry pie featured a beautiful golden flaky crust, green Elderberry, black juicy plums and Pinot Grigio filling with a little vanilla. She made a chantilly cream and a black Elderberry/balsamic sauce to cut the sweetness a bit.
The combo of creamy, flaky, tart, sweet...textures and flavors. This is a winner for our future tasting menu.
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Wild Food Class with Christopher Nyerges
July 2011
This weekend I attended a wild food class given my friend Christopher Nyerges. He has been teaching wild food since 1974 and he is a walking encyclopedia for native plants. I've probably attended 200 of his classes over the years and I always learn something new.
During this class I learned about the long leaf plantain and how to collect the seeds. I've not done much with seeds and it's a field I want to explore a lot more so I can create primitive breads with various seeds.
Christopher has classes every Saturday, you can visit his web site for more information at: www.ChristopherNyerges.com |
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Elderberry Jelly
July 2011
Well, we collected so many elderberries that I had to do something else than just wine so I decided to make some elderberry jelly as well. The process is so easy, crush the berries (or use a handcranked grass juicer like I do) to make elderberry juice. I had 5 cups of juice so I added around 7 cups of organic sugar. Once the mixture is boiling, add some pectine if you want (you can purchase that at the store) or keep boiling until you get the right consistency.
To make sure you reach the right consistency do a test by placing some of the jelly on a plate, place it in the fridge until it's cool then check if the consistency is right for you.
We'll use the jelly to make all kind of culinary goodies such as sauces, etc...
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Green Elderberries Wine - 8 Gallons fermenting...
July 2011
After 5 days of fermenting the juice and sugar/water in a covered large bucket, I was ready for the next step of transferring the "fermenting wine" into a carboy (large glass bottle available in wine stores). Usually you have to wait around 10 days but the temperature was so high that the first fermentation stage was already done in 5 days. I added more sugar/water solution and a bit of yeast too.
An hour later it was bubbling nicely. In another 10 days I'll add more sugar and from there it will simply be a waiting game. Probably a couple of months for the final fermentation then bottling and aging the wine for around 6 months before drinking it. Can't wait!!!!!! |
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Green Elderberries Wine
(Foraging and Juicing 26 pounds of it)
July 2011
Last weekend we collected over 26 pounds of green elderberries. Where I live, we have mostly Mexican elders which usually have black elderberries. But I would say that 60 percent of the local trees have white/greenish elderberries. It was quite perplexing but after doing some research and consulting with some top wild food experts, the conclusion was that some Mexican elders have white/greenish elderberries. Many trees were just dripping with the stuff so Mia and myself collected a bunch (26 pounds) so we could make 8 gallons of wine. Again, I decided to do it "off the grid" and used my handcranked grass juicer to extract the juice. Took a while, maybe an hour and my arm was a bit sore but it will be well worth it.
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Nutgrass (one of the new edible plant this month)
July 2011
This year, while foraging in a local park, I found tons of nutgrass. Nutgrass is a highly invasive plant but you can get even with it by, well...eating it! I really wish people would learn more about edible plants as it would probably solve a lot of problems related to "invasive plants".
Nutgrass has some medicinal properties and has been used to treat fever, inflammation and pain. For food, the tuber (a part of the root similar to a potato) is what's usually used but...I actually had to use the bottom of the stem. It's really very easy to collect, you just pull on the stem with gentle increasing force to detach the root. The first inch or two is very edible and tender. You can collect a lot and eat it raw or cooked. I still have more experiments to do with this plant aside from the usual garlic and parmesan cooking :)
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Wild Food Gourmet Class
July 2011
This weekend we had our wild food gourmet class. In the first part of the class we went for a hike and identified a bunch of edible wild plants such as: Lambsquarters, Passion Fruits, Amaranth, Wild Radish, Wild Mustard, Epazote, Nutgrass, redberries and much more!
At the end of the class we came back to our original location and had a feast with some of the food that Mia and myself had prepared for the class. Mia made an incredible cooked salad with a Lambsquarter/Nettle green sauce and an Elderberries redux sauce. It was just delicious! She also made some elderberry chocolate truffles and cactus pears lolipops. On my side I had prepared several wild food condiments such as: fermented olives (foraged locally), pickled yucca shoots, wild food kimchi, pickled California black walnuts, wild radish pods in a lemon based sauce and much more! It was truly a wild food feast!
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Elderberry Wine - Wild Yeast? Not really...
July 2011
Well, as I wrote earlier, I wanted to use wild yeast to make my elderberry wine but it didn't work so well. I waited for 2 weeks and...nothing. No bubbles, no fermentation. I didn't want to waste my efforts so I simply added some champagne yeast to my elderberry juice/sugar, warmed it a bit and voila! It started bubbling like crazy. After 3 days of bubbling/fermentation, I placed it into a sterile gallon bottle with an airlock (water in it let's CO2 from fermentation out but nothing in). I think it will turn out ok.
I'm not done with using wild yeast. I'm pretty sure the mistake was to not let the crushed berries (with the skin) macerate until the fermentation starts. So next week, I'll retry again and explain the process. Meanwhile I have another 8 gallons fermenting right now and doing well with champagne yeast.
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Canning Wild Radish Pods in Hot & Sour Thai Fish Sauce
July 2011
I love Thai food and recently my students had great feedback about the wild radish pods in Thai fish sauce. So, I thought, why not canning it? And it's exactly what I did! Quite different from my regular pickling recipes. I made 24 jars and the pickling solution was as follow:
- 3 cups Lime
- 1 cup white vinegar
- 2 cups water
- 6 tablespoons of cane sugar
- 4 tablespoons of fish sauce
When the pickling solution was boiling, I added a bunch of fresh cilantro and infused it for 3 minutes then used a strainer to remove the infused cilantro..
For spices, each jar contained 1 chili, 1/2 garlic clove and I also placed some ginger in half the jars as a test,
I'll wait a month before tasting it but the pickling solution was great, a nice harmony between the sugar, the lime and the fish sauce. The PH was below 3.0 so I know it was good to go for water bath pickling. The jars were immersed for 15 minutes in boiling water.
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New Plant of the Month: Purslane (Verdolaga, Pigweed)
July 2011
July is a great time to collect purslane. I usually find it near the water but there are exceptions. While it is considered a weed in the USA, it is often cultivated and eaten as a vegetable in many parts of the world. Every part of the plant can be eaten. The taste is kind of lemony tart and salty in the same time. It's also very mucilagenous like okra.
The plant is loaded with vitamins but also contains a lot of Omega-3 fatty acid (same one you find in fish or buy at the health store).
Purslane can be eaten raw, stir-fried or cooked into soup and stews. I also like to pickle it and make salsa with it. A couple of years ago, I made a purslane salsa I'm still dreaming about. Never wrote the recipe so I'm going to try it again this year and this time write it.
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Wild Food Walk
July 2011
Around 20 people showed up for a wild food walk this Sunday. The new location was Hahamongna Watershed Park. Most the plants in Orcas Park have dried up while in the new location wild food is still abundant. We collected Lambsquarters, Wild Radish, Amaranth, Curly Dock, Epazote and Purslane.
After the walk, we tasted some of the wild food I had previously prepared such as Wild Radish in a Thai fish sauce, pickled foraged olives and black walnuts with hummus, etc...
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Fermented Mission Olives (Foraged Locally)
July 2011
This weekend I finally opened the fermenting crock which contained the fermented olives. They've been fermenting for around 4 months. With the original brine, I also placed some aromatic herbs such as California Bay Laurel, Thyme, Chili, White Sage and garlic.
The fermentation was a succes, the brine was smelling wonderful and was nice/clear. I simply placed the olives and brine in 6 large jars with 1/4 inch of olive oil on top (This reduce the exposure to air and avoid any potential problem).
In the fridge they should last for another year. Stored in the pantry and this being California (hot weather) they should last 4 to 6 months.
Oh, yes...I forgot, they're delicious!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
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Elderberry Wine - Traditional Method with Wild Yeasts
July 2011
I'm going to make several batch of elderberry wine this summer and I wanted to try the traditional way for making it by simply using wild yeasts. There is nothing complicated about it, just make sure that you keep everything clean while doing it, including good washing of your hands. Based on research I came up with the following recipe:
- Gather your elderberries (I collected 6 pounds) and crush them with your (clean) hands for 15 minutes. The skin is where the yeast usually is, so I like to wait an hour or so before separating the skin/seeds. Once this is done, extract the juice. There are various methods of extracting the juice (whatever works really), on my side I used my hand cranked grass juicer which did a terrific job.
Place the juice in a clear container, add 2 pounds of organic sugar and cover it with a cheese cloth from flies. I like cheese cloth because you can still pick up local yeast from the air (as I did when I was making my honey wine last year).
Stir the juice a couple of times each day. The more the better. Pray to your god and wait...the fermentation should start in a few days. It's really hot where I live so I think around 7 days I should have an active fermentation. Chance of success? Probably 80 to 90 percent but hey, if it doesn't work, you may end up with a cool elderberry vinegar too!
(Note July 25 (2 weeks later)...didn't work! See update above for correction)
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Looking for the right clay - Primitive cooking
July 2011
I have a neat little project that I want to do as part of my wild food culinary experiments...cooking dishes in clay. It's a fantastic way to preserve the juices and flavors of a dish. Of course, the first step is to find the right clay. Easier said than done in Southern California. It took a trip to 3 different locations. I thought I had the right clay when I collected some from a dried up lake but it ended up being mostly sandy materials.
At the third location, I found the perfect clay for my project on the side of a river. During the recent floodings 3-4 months ago, a river bank collapsed and exposed a layer of dirt that usually was 10 feet underground. The clay was moist and malleable like play doh. I'm currently in the process of cleaning up the clay - first boiling it (to kill any potential pathogens) and then filtering it to remove organic materials, little rocks, etc...
This is going to be fun :)
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A Natural Soap
California Wild Lilac (Ceanothus thyrsiflorus)
July 2011
While I was a dirttime 2011, I had the opportunity to hike in the local mountains and look at ne plants. We were at higher elevation so it's always exciting to explore and find new plants. We found a decent amount of wild food but I was delighted to find a lot of wild lilac berries.
To make soap with it, you just need to collect the sticky berries, add some water and lather for a rich foam. The lather is much better than the yucca which I usually use to make soap. The smell is also very nice.
I collected a bunch to freeze and dry for future uses.
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Transitional Gastronomy
Wild Green Spring Rolls
July 2011
This is a new dish that Mia made last weekend for our gourmet wild food class.
Perfect for the summer heat, it is made some wild greens spring rolls, they had a little carrot for sweetness and some rice noodles, but otherwise, just the pungeant green of the amaranth, natural sourness of the curly dock and the spiciness of the watercress.
For a little pickled punch, a pinch of pickled purslane.
She also made a wild currant sauce which had a good amount of ginger, garlic and sesame oil...a little molasses to compliment the tartness.
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Traditional Food Preservation Methods
July 2011
This year I was invited as an instructor at Dirttime 2011. I gave a class on traditional food preservation methods. I demonstrated different techniques such as salting, fermenting and canning. During the class I also made a wild food kimchi.
At the end of the class, the attendants were able to sample a lot of the food we had previously made such as pickled walnuts, wild food kimchi, homemade hummus, pickled acorns and much more.
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Dirttime 2011
July 2011
This year I was invited to attend dirttime 2011 as an instructor.
From their web site:
"Dirttime is an annual event where primitive, traditional and modern skills unite to give attendees a week long event filled with education, fun, and exciting times. Dirttime attracts some of the premiere subject matter experts in the country who are willing to share and spend time teaching skills that can help you stay alive in a survival situation."
The web site is: www.dirttime.com
Mia came with me and we camped on site. We were only able to attend the event for 3 days so we missed some of the classes but I learned quite a few new things about primitive trapping, stone knapping, local wild plants, shelters, etc...
We also had the opportunity to hike in the local mountains and discover quite a few new plants such as wild lilac, desert primerose, Basketbush berries and much more...
We had a great time!
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Foraging Wild Rose Hips and Gooseberries
July 2011
Friday is usually the day where I go on a foraging hike and look for plants to make some of wild food culinary experiments during the weekend.
That day I collect a bunch of Lambsquarters, Amaranth, Wild Radish Pods, Wild Currant and two new plants: Gooseberries and Wild Rose Hips. The gooseberries were delicious, I simply ate them raw. Simply press on the berries to remove the skin, the inside just pops out. I haven't done anything with the rose hips yet, just dehydrated them and plan to make tea with it.
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Gourmet Wild Food Class
July 2011
This weekend we had our gourmet wild food class. Around 15 people attended the class. First we went on a short wild food walk. The location (Orcas Park) is getting really dry and it's probably my last class there but we still found some fennel (pretty dried up though), we stopped 15 minutes to collect wild currant and some (early) elderberries. We found some mustard, lambsquarters, amaranth and various medicinal plants.
At the end of the class we had some of the wild green spring rolls that Mia made, we also had some hummus and kimchi wrapped in eggplant skins. We also had a bunch of wild food samples such as pickled acorns and walnuts, wild radish pods in Thai fish sauce and much more.
The students also made lemonade with lemonade berries.
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