11/28/2017
Foraged winter pantry dreams // Learning how to forage is a major game changer for any human. These skills are our birthright, but sadly most of us didn’t grow up learning them. Gathering medicine and food from the wild connects us to the natural world, our ancestral heritage, and our wild animal selves. When we are more personally involved with our foods and medicines (by growing or gathering), we can be assured that they are fresh, of high quality, and harvested in a sustainable fashion. We also weave ourselves indelibly into the great food chain of life, which instinctively encourages us to steward and tend our sources of sustenance.
In my mind, the most sustainable way to gather food and medicine from wild places is to hone in on a particular array of plentiful, generous, and nourishing plants. These herbs are the wild weeds, the common flora, the invasives—the prolific volunteers that are often tossed into the compost pile. These are also some of our most superb medicinal allies and nutrient-rich wild foods! I’m talking about plants like chickweed, dandelion, wild rose, burdock, cleavers, violet, blackberry, and stinging nettles. Believe me, getting to know these plants is a bit like working a magic spell—the ordinary suddenly becomes extraordinary, astounding, beloved.
~ For our guidance on sustainable + safe wild food + medicine foraging, visit the blog: https://chestnutherbs.com/foraging-for-wild-edibles-and-herbs-sustainable-and-safe-gathering-practices/. And stay tuned for our upcoming Online Foraging Course!
Picture perfect illustration by Jill Barklem of Brambly Hedge Official. Many thanks for generously allowing us to use your gorgeous images!
