Living on foraged food for a year!

[ina]

Farming today this morning:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/news/farmingtoday/


"If you're worried about sky-rocketing food prices, genetically modified crops and intensive agriculture, then Farming Today has a simple solution. Fergus Drennan is a dedicated forager - whether it's dock seeds or road kill-badger, if it’s wild and free Fergus can turn it into a tempting banquet. But dabbling's not enough for Fergus. He’s about to start a year of living on absolutely nothing but wild food. He tells all to Mark Holdstock, including revealing one of the unsavoury ingredients in his homemade biscuits."

[Wombat]

Farming today this morning:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/news/farmingtoday/


"If you're worried about sky-rocketing food prices, genetically modified crops and intensive agriculture, then Farming Today has a simple solution. Fergus Drennan is a dedicated forager - whether it's dock seeds or road kill-badger, if it’s wild and free Fergus can turn it into a tempting banquet. But dabbling's not enough for Fergus. He’s about to start a year of living on absolutely nothing but wild food. He tells all to Mark Holdstock, including revealing one of the unsavoury ingredients in his homemade biscuits."

If I tried that around here I'd be subsisting on grass, gum leaves and dog crap

Nev

[Bonniegirl]

Grass?? What's that stuff then? We ain't got none o' that here in the Waikato!

[ina]

If I tried that around here I'd be subsisting on grass, gum leaves and dog crap

Yuk!

No, it's a bit better here. He has already done it once for a shorter period of time, and he's made some kind of flour from roots, and gets fat (lard, in effect) from badgers...

[Wombat]

If I tried that around here I'd be subsisting on grass, gum leaves and dog crap

Yuk!

No, it's a bit better here. He has already done it once for a shorter period of time, and he's made some kind of flour from roots, and gets fat (lard, in effect) from badgers...

aaah! Animals of course! I could always extract the fat from our neighbours chihuahua! But I don't think that either of us would enjoy that much

Nev

[MKG]

C'mon Nev - be adventurous. What about fillet of Red-bellied Black sauteed in saltwater crocodile lard? Wallaby burger (pre-minced if what I saw of Oz roads is right) with a piquant Funnelweb sauce? Crunchy Platypus spur with Carpet Snake fritters?

Might not taste great, but you'd certainly keep fit just by staying alive.

[Wombat]

C'mon Nev - be adventurous. What about fillet of Red-bellied Black sauteed in saltwater crocodile lard? Wallaby burger (pre-minced if what I saw of Oz roads is right) with a piquant Funnelweb sauce? Crunchy Platypus spur with Carpet Snake fritters?

Might not taste great, but you'd certainly keep fit just by staying alive.

Ummm, MKG

I live in Sydney! So you can scratch just about everything but the funnelwebs, and the afforementioned grass, gum leaves, dog crap and chihuahua

Nev

[Chickenlady]

You lot are so cynical!!!! I was reading about him in The Ecologist and this month he can choose from:

birch and lime sap; winter cress; chickweed; hairy bittercress (hairy??); scurvy grass; sea puslane, japanese knotweed; wild garlic; alexanders; charlock; honesty; reed mace; nettles; cleavers; wood sorrel, dandelion, common mallow, hedge mustard; jelly-ear fungus....

That last one sounds particularly delicious washed down with a nice mug of birch and lime sap.

[Millymollymandy]

You're not going to get very full eating that lot! Bleugh!

[eccentric_emma]

apparently jelly ear fungus is delicious but it looks awful. think i would have to eat it blindfolded.

[ina]

You're not going to get very full eating that lot! Bleugh!

Don't forget - there's loads of roadkill, too. The pheasants around here are looking quite well fed; all those bird tables...

[Silver Ether]

apparently jelly ear fungus is delicious but it looks awful. think i would have to eat it blindfolded.

I read that you can cut into slivers and add it to stews ... you would not notice it then ...

[Trinity]

Hi Ina,

Do you know where the original article or link is please?

Joking aside (thanks for the entertainment guys), sorry to be boring, but I'd really love to read/hear more about this.

Heartfelt thanks
Trinity

[ina]

It was on radio 4, farming today. As it's more than a week ago, I suppose you won't be able to listen to it again... But I think he's been in the news in several places, so might be in a newspaper somewhere or other? I think he's in the Ecologist, too - but again, not everything in there can be accessed online....

[Trinity]

Thanks Ina

Upon further looking Fergus has a website...

http://www.wildmanwildfood.com/

I don't listen to the radio or have a t.v. so I am often missing out on these little things.