GBAChef: Wild foods you collect and eat

[FAST6191]

Seems fruit season is a bit early this year so right now I am having any number of apples (cooking and eating) and blackberries off the bushes and trees on footpaths and field edges around here. As I am a reprobate of extraordinarily low breeding I also scrumped a plum from the lady of the manor when walking the dog ( https://gbatemp.net/threads/your-favorite-breed-of-dog.496024/page-2#post-7850866 ), though got a bag of sugarplums elsewhere. Decided against rosehips and elderberries thus far, though might at some point if I am less lazy and can think of something to do with them (or make a press in the case of elderberries).

Crab apples will probably be next week so as to make crab apple jelly. If the squirrels have not got them then I will have walnuts as well. The crows got the cherries this year. Did get some greengages a few weeks back but they went quickly. Will probably get some sloes before long as well but I don't care for sloe gin and that is about all anybody does with them. Back when I lived in a town there were also pears and quinces but have not found any in the villages or paths around here.

Other than rabbits and pheasants there is not a lot of hunting done around here but I will take that too if you want.

To make it a question then what wild fruits, nuts and vegetables do you collect or animals you hunt?

 

[Alexander1970]

The hunt of the farmer for people who did not legally pick fruit from "their" trees and shrubs, is now a thing of the past..I think...

Here in the "village" there are still many such places where there are still freely accessible fruit trees and bushes from which one can take without immediately approaching the Inquisition.

Actual Apples and Pears.Grapes are still a bit sour.
Walnuts almost not anymore,because the trees are sadly all sick.

Thank you.

 

[Ryccardo]

Nothing really, I'm a city man...

...but I do pick up broken-often-in-name-only PCs and TVs left outside trash cans

 

[NoNAND]

Nothing in particular. Never hunted but would like to taste exotic animals at least once in a lifetime. though, I'd better stay away from them given the multitude of hosts of viruses and germs they may spread to humans

 

[FAST6191]

Nothing really, I'm a city man...

...but I do pick up broken-often-in-name-only PCs and TVs left outside trash cans

Cities around here that are not London (though even then the canals were not bad) tend to have some nice fruit trees around. Often even some legacy varieties that nobody sells in supermarkets any more.

Also living in the country does not mean you lack skips to fish out building supplies and "broken" or old electronics.

 

[Glyptofane]

I've eaten wild apples, crabapples, persimmons, pawpaws, dandelions, insects, venison, and pet food. That's about it.

 

[DinohScene]

I used to pick juniper berries and black berries when I was walking the dog of me mum n dad.

 

[x65943]

I always eat mulberries in the late summer. They grow wild everywhere in the midwest.

Every once in a while I'll go for a honeysuckle as well.

My little bro likes to eat the wild lemon grass.

There are some other wild fruits as well but I never managed to figure out some of their names.

 

[Veho]

I was going to say "not a lot" but I do graze on a number of things whenever I can be bothered to go out.

You can find almonds, walnuts and hazelnuts here in the city, as well as a few varieties of plums and plumlike stuff.
Parks and nearby forests have chestnuts but none of those escape the determined waves of foragers who all get up way earlier in the morning than I, so there's no point.
I don't know anything about mushrooms so I avoid them. There's a lot of those around but I get mine from the store, safest way.
I would not trust any of the local waterways for fish. I really wouldn't.


When I go to the seaside there's blackberries, figs, honeysuckle, and one or two pine trees of the sort that has pine nuts, but they're very out of the way so yeah. Wild asparagus. Herbs and spices, I can gather enough rosemary, oregano, thyme and sage for a year in one hike.
There are some very very tiny areas where one can find truffles, provided one has a truffle hog with them, or is tilling their field by hand, both of which I so very rarely do these days, so I haven't had any of those lately.

 

[FAST6191]

You can have a truffle dog these days as well. Mind you I have tried truffles before (oil form and sliced) and they join caviar in things which are edible but I would not seek out.
That is also a lot of nuts around there. Walnuts, beech and if you kill all the squirrels around you then just maybe a few hazelnuts are all I would expect, assuming you don't count acorns (which are best given to pigs really). Though I suppose if you are rather lower in latitude that affords a few more options.

On a different note in update to my wild plums the other day. Stewed them up, removed the stones and stuck it with some other berries ( https://www.tesco.com/groceries/en-GB/products/295653714 ) in a crumble which gave it a slightly sour/tart effect which was most appreciated.

 

[Veho]

You can have a truffle dog these days as well. Mind you I have tried truffles before (oil form and sliced) and they join caviar in things which are edible but I would not seek out.

It's not everyone's cup of tea.

Truffle oil has done for truffles what vanillin has done for vanilla. Actual vanilla has hundreds of flavor compounds, but vanillin is so much cheaper but it's "close enough" so now when people think of vanilla they think of the lame, one-note, artificial-tasting flavoring that's used everywhere and has become synonymous with "boring".
Same with truffles; 2,4-dithiapentane is vastly cheaper than real truffles, so now there's a generation of people who think they know what truffles taste like based on one component that doesn't tell the whole story.

That being said, real truffles smell like old socks and taste a little like a turnip (that was wrapped in said old sock). Definitely not everyone's cup of tea.

That is also a lot of nuts around there. Walnuts, beech and if you kill all the squirrels around you then just maybe a few hazelnuts are all I would expect, assuming you don't count acorns (which are best given to pigs really).

Not a lot of squirrels in the city. Very few parks or green areas are large enough to sustain a population on their own, and they are too far between to be worth the commute across rooftops. I suppose rats could gather the fallen nuts but apparently they find the many, many dumpsters around more appetizing. Basically the only animal eating them are the crows (you can see them dropping walnuts onto the pavement to crack them) but that's about it.

 

[Deleted member 507653]

Mulberries into jam or tea, morels at the right time of year, hazelnuts and walnuts, dandelion greens into salad (be careful where you get these, they might have weed killer on them).

Sometimes if you get lucky you can find some oyster mushrooms or chicken-of-the-woods in the ...woods. They're quite distinctive-looking.

Foraging is fun! :-)

 

[JuanMena]

Amazing Tom. I'm jumping through your posts. It's so nice to see a real man that still hunts.

Unfortunately, I'm too bland to actually hunt an animal other than fishing... literally you just take them out of the water and that's enough for them to die...

I've lived almost my entire life in a city
But as a child I lived plenty of months in different years in a rural state on the south of my country.

Literally best time ever (I was 3 to 7 years old back then) and I got to fish, harvest herbs, seeds, fruits, mushrooms, milk cows, goats... although I too got to see my grandma kill a chicken (and the poor wont die regardless of being throat sliced... no wonder why I'm like this now that I think about it)
Those are the only times I truly got to hunt/harvest food.

And most of the time we used the ingredients to make regular dishes.

I also know how's mike to be chased by Goose's and Bulls

 

[Julie_Pilgrim]

Did flame just remove his own post?