My fling with foraging...

Here we go. I've been wanting to start writing about a subject which I have become increasingly interested in since moving to Latvia; the culinary and medicinal uses of wild foraged food.

I guess I've always been a bit of a forager; I gain delight in gleaning fruit from local neighbourhood trees, find eating a self-caught fish to be mighty satisfying, and had an ear-to-ear grin as a kid as I munched on sour-sobs in the schoolyard.

My interest in foraging has burgeoned recently due to several factors. Firstly, a winter in Latvia can be subtly depressing, there is a lack of colour which is so abundant in all other times of the year, and one craves to see a flower, a bud, a leaf, even a weed. So I guess I'm currently, as nature is starting to wake up once again, ready and eager to burst forth and embrace the bounty that it has to offer.

Another reason for my heightened interest in foraging is the wonderful attitude and relationship Latvians, and many Europeans in general, have towards nature and what it can provide. I was ill last year and as I waited in line in the pharmacy I noticed that natural remedies (which Australians would class in the 'alternative medicine' category) were just as common, if not more, as processed drugs which the Western world is more accustomed to. As I asked for my pain-killers an old pensioner next to me asked for mushroom juice (Phallus impudicus), and as the pharmacist pulled open a draw full of natural tinctures and teas and poultices I thought how in Australia I would have to go to an alternative medicine store which reeks of sandalwood incense and over the drifting sounds of some generic world-music album have to ask for a silly thing like 'Marge's mystic monk-balls' or something in that vein. Here, in Latvia, there exists a practical culture where many people still may prefer natural remedies over 'conventional' medicine, and, as it turns out, much folk medicine is becoming scientifically backed up.

I started looking at literature regarding natural medicine and subsequently discovered the tantalising world of wild food. I have grown up in the suburbs and been fed from grocery stores and packaged foods all my life (except for the odd neighbourhood feijoa or a trout while camping) and I have come to discover that in nature there is very little which actually cannot be consumed. Latvians know this very well and foraging is very popular here (although they don't see it as something out of the ordinary, for them the outdoors is more or less a larder and an apothecary).

Armed with the internet, some wonderful books I have purchased (I would recommend 'Food for Free' by Richard Mabey), some local knowledge, and a general appetite, I am hoping this year to discover and experiment with wild foraged food, medicine, and possibly a few beverages.

I'm not a herbalist or a hippy or a pioneer. I'm not doing anything new, I'm just a 20-something guy who writes financial news for a crust and has an interest in all sorts of subjects. I definitely don't want to be associated with blogs like "The Herbalist's Path" *shudder*.

I originally had big plans for a completely separate blog where I can write these foraging articles, but partly out of laziness I decided to keep it all in this old blog. I hope you enjoy my foraging as much as I will.

-M.