what free wild food is easiest to get

[fuggles]

I know nettles are the easiest. Im also looking for grass.

can any grass be juiced ?? how do I identify different grasses.

Also, can the nettle stem be juiced aswell ? along with the leaves

theres a lot of nettles waiting to be eaten around where I live.

[DopeRawAbundance]

It depends where you live... dandelions, mulberries, and acorns are a start... for these all grow in my yard. I guess my yard isn't the wildest of the wild but...

[fuggles]

Mulberries ? are they exotic

[freshlight]

nettles are great. you can eat the stems as far as I know

[DopeRawAbundance]

Mulberries on a tree (these leaves look different from mine but the berries are the same)

http://www.wildmanstevebrill.com/JPEG%27S/Plant%20Web%20Images/RedMulberries.jpg

Mulberries on a plate (bon appetit)

http://giniann.files.wordpress.com/2007/07/mulberries-on-a-plate.jpg

Mulberries 4 sale

http://cn1.kaboodle.com/hi/img/b/0/0/52/6/AAAAC8U5hygAAAAAAFJsTw.jpg


I live in Indiana and they're quite common in my area.

[fuggles]

Ill start slowly and just use the nettles

How strong is the juice taste does anyone know?

[Tsurugi_Oni]

I'm pretty sure you can eat nearly any type of common grass, although wheatgrass is the juciest. Mulberries.... probably my absolute favorite berry!! And you can raise silkworms for silk with the leaves =p.

Wild apples and grapes are super easy to identify. Wild blackberries and strawberries are also pretty easy to identify. I'm pretty sure there aren't any poisonous multipleberries either so you dont' have to worry about dying from a look-a-like. Early -> Mid fall is wild nuts time, so I would go check wild nut tree in about 3 weeks. Knock a couple down and crack em open. If it looks like the meat is pretty much formed then they are about ready to harvest. You want to harvest them before the squirrels do, so you probably want to knock them off of the tree.

[coco]

Chicory, sorrel, lambsquarter, dandelion, wild ginger, wild asparagus, wild onion, mushrooms, berries, nuts, apples, purslane, wild violets, clover, burdock, plantain, chickweed... I could go on and on. It's worth picking up a book of wild edible plants for your area. I have a few of them with wonderful colour photos that help to positively identify edible plants (because of course you should Never eat anything that you are not absolutely sure of. Many good tasting berries are incredibly poisonous, mushrooms too and some herbs including ferns like fiddle heads which are edible but toxic if eaten raw).

Take care and have fun. Foraging for wild foods is an incredible experience.

Oh, and if you care for the taste of nettle stem leaf you can juice it if you like. As for grasses, most are not as tasty or nutritious as some of the other wild greens listed above. You can certainly sow some cereal grain seeds in the wild and let them go to seed for wild grasses the next year. And sweet grass is edible when young and tender as well.

Here is a link I quickly searched for, it looks pretty good...

http://www.wikihow.com/Find-Wild-Edible-Plants

[spicyfull]

http://davesgarden.com/community/forums/

[Vrindavan]

i guess it is fun to learn what can be eaten.

Which book is particularly good on this ?

[Marin Mom]

You are so lucky to have nettles nearby! They cure so much. I have to buy them at Farmer's market for $6.00/lb.

I just had a green smoothie with nettles. I have juiced them before and also dry it to make tea when I run out of fresh. Also herbal tinctures.

There is wild onion growing all over our neighborhood and miner's lettuce. Free food everywhere!

[Amarynth]

Oh..so those are mulberries??!! I remember gorging on these as a little girl..there was a HUGE bush or tree not far from my childhood home. They were SO good. I forgot all about them until I saw this post.

Now for Dandelions, is there a special way to prepare/clean them? I always get a bunch in my yard and think I'm going to try them this spring.

As for nettles, I'm going to have to google that. Never heard of them.

[joyce09]

I have several times read people mentioning nettles as edible plants one can easily find in one's backyard. Does anyone have a photo of the plant?

[RawKnitster]

I have several times read people mentioning nettles as edible plants one can easily find in one's backyard. Does anyone have a photo of the plant?

I picked nettles yesterday. Posted pics of the nettle beds on my blog today.

I'm still scared of drinking a nettle smoothie. I did a banana search and see that several people are doing it. How exactly do you make a nettle smoothie? With freshly picked nettles? The whole plant or just the leaves?

[DebB]

Hi Raw Knitster ~ The liferegenerator just did a video yesterday with juicing wild nettles (Cashew 'Mock Chicken' Salad) (minute marker 3:40). He did it with gloves on. I know you asked about making them into a smoothie, but it must be the season up there! I see he's got another stinging nettles video (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VNsozwfR9pQ)too. Maybe there's some useful info on those. *Ü*

[joyce09]

Thank you ladies for the photo and the video.

[wildfoods]

dandelions are abundant almost everywhere, and they're super tasty. You can saute the greens or use the heads to infuse flavor into honey. Wild foods chef Sunny Savage is a big proponent of foraging dandelions for cooking. She's being featured this week at veria.com if you want to check her out: http://www.veria.com/hott-headquarters.html

[WestVirginiaRaw]

Lambsquarter is everywhere and very nutritious and tastes pretty good too.