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There is an isolated patch of stinging nettles (Urtica dioica) along the Charles River in Boston. They can be seen in the early spring, but soon they get covered up by the desert false indigo (Amorpha fruticosa) that grows all along the banks. At the end of fall, when all the indigo has been cut back, the nettles make a brief reappearance. Many edible spring greens make a fall reappearance in fact. There is still enough warmth so that their leaves do not freeze, and the leaves of the tall trees and the shrubs that have been shading them all summer have dropped away, so they come out again to gather the last of the fall sunlight and fatten their roots. And so even in early December, even after a little snow, I can still go out and gather some nettles, some curly dock (Rumex crispus), dandelion greens (Taraxacum officinale) and ox-eye daisy greens (Leucanthemum vulgare). While the ground is not yet frozen, burdock root (Arctium lappa) and evening primrose root (Oenothera biennis) are available too.

By the time March rolls around, evening primrose rosettes are back out, making January and February the only two full months of the forager's lament. I alleviate the lament by stocking up for the winter months by jarring, drying, and freezing. Whatever I jar usually ends up in the freezer because I'm always too rushed to do a good job with the sterilization process. Too many things going on in the summer in the city to do a good grandmotherly job jarring up the apple sauce. I bought a cheap food dryer on craigslist last year, which makes drying tea herbs and apples for winter usage easy. Somehow I even cut corners on drying my apples and I noticed some fruit flies on them a few days later. They are in my refrigerator now. Although I'd like to embrace additional aggressive eco-stunts including “unplugging the fridge”, given my ineptitude with jarring and drying, I'm not ready for that yet.

Rather than spend too much time lamenting the frozen ground, I prefer to catch up on the things I've missed because of foraging too much – reading, watching movies, studying up on mushrooms. Just the other day a friend forwarded me an article on dumpster diving [link to http://www.boston.com/news/local/breaking_news/2009/12/for_local_freeg.html] and this got me thinking: I don't need to forgo foraging afterall in the winter, I can turn to a much more urban version of it – jumping into grocery dumpsters late night and digging out the perfectly good food that gets thrown away in quantities I don't like to think about every day. One of the things that attracted to me to foraging in the first place was that foraged food is free. Dumpster food is neither Local nor In Season, but it is a sad waste that occurs on a massive scale. I am a little worried that when I do my first dive, there will be so many viable munchies I won't know what to do with myself (I sometimes have this feeling when I find a neglected apple tree loaded with fruit – I sigh and wonder when I'm going to have the time to chop and jar all of the apples that I'm stuffing into my backpack). I am really hoping I do not find OK meat. I'm a vegan usually, but my policy is, if an animal product is getting tossed, I eat it. It's bad enough that people eat factory-raised meat, but then to have it thrown out, ugh. I hope not have to face the dilemma of 'should I take those packages of ham?' Please let my first dumpster be filled with slightly bruised bananas, day old whole wheat bagels, and celery.

Seeding the garden

Lest anyone think foraging in New England is over, it's not. At mom's over the weekend, we made some burdock oyaki (fried mashed potato pancakes stuffed with burdock/carrot/soy sauce mixture). I also gathered and dried a bunch of mint, and almost went for some mussels, but stayed vegan thanks to high tide.

I went "seeding" this morning along the Charles because I'm going for a "natural" garden in the style of Fukuoka next year, where I encourage all the great weeds of the area to grow in my garden. So, I gathered seeds of milkweed, burdock, evening primrose, and lamb's quarters, and put them in my garden.

Beech trees, nettles, black robes

Some highlights from my recent trip to The Netherlands.

* An hour at the Sauna Deco. I asked the lady at the front desk if they had bathing suits in addition to the towels for the spa, which was "co-ed" but primarily men > 50. She replied, "NO! we are totally nude!".

* Black robes worn by the entire thesis committee for the defense I was a part of. This was good because it hid the fact that I was wearing brown cords and looked like hell compared to everyone else in their suits and ties. The Q/A session was pretty funny, one questioner heavily citing his own research, and someone fainting on stage towards the end of the session.

* Tilburg forest filled with beech trees, black berry brambles, and nettles. And some weird running competition that I asked an older couple about and they replied things like: "Chops" and "Clogs" and "Warande" and I of course said yes, yes, yes as if I had any clue what they were saying.

* The coffeehouse scene is weird. People go in there and roll huge joints and really make a big thing about it. It's kind of like, listen, you're just rolling a joint, take it easy. Man, they go to town though, with their props and all. Flower shops selling tulip bulbs also carried pot seeds. I almost bought some but didn't want any trouble getting back into the good old U S of A.

2 Hauls

While everyone was in town this weekend (Brian, Shannon, Alex) we still found some time for foraging. Shannon, west coast forager famous for almost poisoning a dinner party of botanists, joined me both times. The haul on the first day out was a grocery bag full of oyster mushrooms. The haul on the second day, at the end of a walk in the Fells, was 2 bags of quince fruit, ripe and not too buggy. Sometime in the next 36 hours (before Holland trip) I need to find some time to chop them up. Call it global warming or something else, but foraging is still going strong. Burdock, plenty of greens (a bunch of beautiful ox-eye daisy rosettes), and evening primrose roots too still abound.

I'm going to get in trouble for tapping Cambridge maple trees next winter.

Oh well.

Cantaloupe Dune

Two foraging highlights from my research retreat weekend in Gloucester.

1) A cantaloupe plant growing on a beach dune with a viable cantaloupe that I took. I ended up eating the whole thing later that day (it was salty, as expected for fruit growing on a beach) since the meeting started at 2 and no food was served until 8 -- that's a long time for a 95%vegan to go without food.

2) Big bands of kelp on the shore. I ate some of that raw and took a bunch home and dried it. It's already successfully gone into one soup.

Also grabbed some autumn olives and wild mustard greens, which were growing abundantly along Atlantic Road.

Retreat was very nice, even if the staff were a tad freaky. The Addams family or something going on there.

Halloween

Today is warm Halloween. I woke up with 3 hours to kill before having to be at the Gallery, so I headed out for a bike ride to Lexington, along the Minuteman Trail. First stop was some bittersweet for Sarah B's costume. Not edible.

next stop was a couple of pretty good looking patches of stinging nettles, so I bagged up some of those. I poked around in some woods around there. Mostly maple along the minuteman, so not a good chance for hen-hunting, but I did find one old hen-of-the-woods. It was taken over largely by mold but I can't let a hen go, even if moldy, so I cut out some of the better looking pieces.

Then, on my way home, I took a walk onto a meadow trail and found a chicken that was in better shape. I had run out of bags so I bundled up as much of it as I could and balanced it back to my bike. My few bags were filled up - I'm trying to get better about bringing enough but this seems to happen no matter how many I bring. And then, passing through Alewife Pond Reservation, I hit upon a high bush cranberry that was loaded. In they went, right on top of the nettles. That will be fun to sort out later.

Rob and I chatted over a couple of beers last night about an age-old topic for us: the COMMUNE. Buy some land around here (my stipulation; needs to be within 2 hours of beantown, I like beantown) and go pioneer, building up houses and gardens. Eventually it turns into a place where writers, artists, musicians, like-minded people come to stay for a brief term to get away from the grind. This idea is not a complete check-out from society, more of a picking and choosing of the prime parts, and emphasizing work and back-to-the-land, and art and creativity. Every time we discuss this, it seems a little closer to possibly happening in some baby-step capacity. Anyhow, fun to think about.

Foraged soup for the intern-dinner last night; burdock root, evening primrose root, evening primrose seeds (they are finally out, and not that hard to gather!), lamb's quarters, narrow leaf plantain, dandelion greens, curly dock, and then a bunch of stuff from Trader Joe's to make it reasonable.

It looks like The Bread Machine show might happen. Bread machines on the gallery walls, one going off or so every hour with a fresh loaf, and these loaves being tweeted about. First come first served. I have to find a local wheat producers, and get some of my mother's antique toasters...a few of them will go up also. I think this show will warm up January quite nicely.