Backyard Foraging: 65 Familiar Plants You Didn't Know You Could Eat

by Ellen Zachos

Overview

There’s food growing everywhere! You’ll be amazed by how many of the plants you see each day are actually nutritious edibles. Ideal for first-time foragers, this book features 70 edible weeds, flowers, mushrooms, and ornamental plants typically found in urban and suburban neighborhoods. Full-color photographs make identification easy, while tips on common plant locations, pesticides, pollution, and dangerous flora make foraging as safe and simple as stepping into your own backyard.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781612120096
Publisher:	Storey Publishing, LLC
Publication date:	03/12/2013
Pages:	240
Sales rank:	321,383
Product dimensions:	6.90(w) x 8.90(h) x 0.60(d)

About the Author

Ellen Zachos is an expert forager and longtime foraging instructor. She is the author of six books, including The Wildcrafted Cocktail and Backyard Foraging. She is co-host of the Plantrama podcast and can be found online at backyardforager.com.

Table of Contents

Introduction

 

1 Getting Started: Identifying Habitats in the 'Hood

Ensuring Safety * Ethical Harvesting

 

2 Harvest with Care: You Don't Have to Sacrifice Your Scenery

Picking Shoots and Young Foliage * Foraging Flowers, Fruits, and Nuts * Digging Roots and Tubers * Timing for Taste

 

3 Grazing Greens: Tasty Leaves and Stems

 

4 The Fruits of Nature's Labor: Edible Flowers and Fruits

 

5 Nature's Granola: Nuts and Seeds

 

6 Hidden Treasure: Roots, Tubers, and Rhizomes

 

7 Superstars: Plants with Many Edible Parts

 

8 Friendly Fungi: Five Easy Mushrooms

 

9 You Wouldn't Do This If It Didn't Taste Good: Preserving Advice and Basic Recipes

Freezing * Dehydration * Syrups, Jams, and Jellies * Booze * Baked Goods and Savory Dishes * Fruity Miscellany * Resources and Recommended Reading * Books about Wild Edible Plants * Foraging Books and Blogs * Mushrooms * Vendors of Mushroom-Growing Supplies * Food Preparation

 

Interior Photography Credits

 

Index

What People are Saying About This

director of Wild Food Adventures John Kallas

"A worthy and eye-opening addition to anyone's personal wild food library."

Author of Nature's Garden and The Forager's Harv Samuel Thayer

"There is a food frontier nine steps from your backdoor, and Ellen Zachos is giving a tour. In this beautiful and accessible guidebook, she introduces us to the culinary use of a wealth of free, exotic, and gourmet produce that almost nobody knew existed."

author of Kiss My Aster Amanda Thomsen

"I think of myself as a backyard know-it-all, but this book schooled me! I found myself exclaiming "no way!"at page after page."

Daniel Klein

"Suddenly, a walk through the garden becomes a treasure hunt."

Gary Lincoff

"This is the book I had when I first got interested in eating 'wild'."

Editorial Reviews

…extremely appealing…Forget farm to table. Here's weed to bowl.

The New York Times Book Review - Dominique Browning

Foraging is all the culinary rage these days, but the idea of harvesting backyard ‘shrooms for use in store-bought pasta and salads may be off putting to those scared of severe hallucinations. But Zachos, who leads foraging walks and teaches at the New York Botanical Garden, ushers the reader safely through the foliage where ants and beetles roam and into the enlightened land, where sheep sorrel, chickweed, dandelion, sumac, and prickly pear become edible parts on the most discerning palate. Unfamiliar edibles are described at length, with instructions for their harvest and preparation time when cooking. With such wholesome food comes also vindication: our parents really were wrong when they said we couldn’t eat acorns. (Mar.)

Publishers Weekly

[An] impressively comprehensive guide by horticulturist Zachos, who stresses the “ease and elegance” of foraging familiar plants—greens, fruits, nuts, seeds, tubers, and fungi—in yards and nearby environs. … Eye-catching sidebars on legality, quick plant identification, food-preparation tips, and more accompany the main text, which is abundantly illustrated with full-color photos throughout.”

—John Kallas, director of Wild Food Adventures

“Forget farm to table. Here’s weed to bowl. ... Extremely appealing.”

From the Publisher

[An] impressively comprehensive guide by horticulturist Zachos, who stresses the “ease and elegance” of foraging familiar plants—greens, fruits, nuts, seeds, tubers, and fungi—in yards and nearby environs. … Eye-catching sidebars on legality, quick plant identification, food-preparation tips, and more accompany the main text, which is abundantly illustrated with full-color photos throughout.”

director of Wild Food Adventures John Kallas

Forget farm to table. Here’s weed to bowl. ... Extremely appealing.”

The New York Times

[An] impressively comprehensive guide by horticulturist Zachos, who stresses the “ease and elegance” of foraging familiar plants—greens, fruits, nuts, seeds, tubers, and fungi—in yards and nearby environs. … Eye-catching sidebars on legality, quick plant identification, food-preparation tips, and more accompany the main text, which is abundantly illustrated with full-color photos throughout.”

Booklist

Hungry for a healthy snack? While Musselman, et al., cover wild plants, certified horticulturist Zachos suggests you simply visit your yard, where you can nibble on cultivated landscape plants such as hosta or munch on some mulberries. With Zachos as your knowledgeable and witty guide, you will soon see common landscape plants and garden weeds, etc., as a smorgasbord of edible fruits, vegetables, flowers, roots, nuts, and fungi. Chapters cover general information about foraging plus profiles of edible plants arranged by plant part (greens, fruits, nuts and seeds, etc.), and offer some basic recipes and information on preserving your foraged fare. Each profile includes a short description of the plant, where to find it, and how to harvest and eat it, along with lovely color photos. Unfortunately, the profiles do not include USDA hardiness zones or regions in which the plants are commonly found. The book includes very brief, general content on cultivation, but since the plants are quite common, that data can be easily found elsewhere. There is also a short but excellent annotated list of additional sources of information. VERDICT Readers interested in local food and new tastes will enjoy this clear, well-illustrated guide to the culinary delights lurking nearby.—Janet Crum, City of Hope Lib., Duarte, CA

Library Journal