Have you ever gathered your own food from wild plants and eaten it at home?

ive killed my own fish and my grandmother scaled it, gutted it and cleaned it. the entire family ate it. ive made my own pickles from cucumbers and home made vinegar (acetic acid—its easy to make), as well as pickled onions and tomatoes. ive also milked a cow and had the milk right after, while it was still warm smooth.

I’m not sure if this counts as wild, but since I live in the Bay Area, there are lots of foods to be picked just from the trees outside people’s homes. In Michael Pollan’s book Omnivore’s Dillemma, he writes about how it’s perfectly legal to pick fruit from branches that hang over someone’s fence and onto the street – it’s called your “usufruct right” – so I’ve had some delicious plums and figs that I’ve plucked from trees on the street in Berkeley.

I love his book.. but I live in MO. I guess I’m more curious about plants that you see everywhere, but that are edible and safe.

Here’s another one – I pick orange nosturtiums when I see them by the side of the road and eat them or bring them home to add to salad…they are delicious and spicy. The name comes from the latin for “nose-twist” because of the spiciness.

You can find rosemary everywhere. I pick the rosemary and onions from the backyard. I fry red potatoes in olive oil along with the onion (sliced up) and fresh rosemary, sometimes with a little garlic. Man, I’m getting really hungry.

Yes many times and many things including thistle.

yeah, and i had the biggest trip ever!

I dont know if this really counts but I go into the woods during the right season and pick all the berries I can. Sometimes I bring them home if they aren’t all eaten by the time I get there.

You can pick the tips of cattails when they are young; strip off the fluff and sauté them in butter. It’s not MY favorite dish but my sister and her kids love them.

Young and tender dandelion leaves and wild sorrel also good mixed w. other salad greens. And there are places where watercress grows wild… not in the NE US however.

Dandelion greens, ramps (young, wild onions), fiddlehead ferns (the last two are in season now!), hen of the woods mushrooms…

no, i saw into the wild and i know that would probably happen to me if i tried.