06/06/2022
Another benefit to foraging is how incredibly good for you some wild food is, and how it can grow on your door step.
Let’s take the Common Nettle (Urtica Dioica) This plant is often considered a nuisance, and many think that it’s stinging leaves render it inedible. This plant is in fact a superfood! And contains Potassium, Iron, Magnesium, Protein, Calcium and Vitamin C!
It also grows pretty much everywhere, so is easily harvested with a pair of gloves. Let’s consider how different things would be if we were to purchase this plant from a supermarket.
Well, firstly there would be the price tag that comes with the label of “superfood” but we would also need to consider the refrigerated vans that would transport the plant from the field it was cultivated in to the supermarket shelves, these are referred to as “food miles.” The field in question would usually be treated with pesticides to kill insects and herbicides to kill weeds (expect to pay extra for organic) and the land would be given over to a mono-culture, preventing important plant diversity.
An incredible benefit of wild food foraging is that it involves little to no food miles. Even if you need to jump on a bus or train to get to a good patch of green, it’s still much much less than the food miles supermarket vans rack up whilst driving all over the country. It really is local in every sense of the word, which in turn means it’s always as fresh as possible. You can harvest a plant and be happily eating it within the next hour, improving the taste and preventing nutrient depletion, this is something that’s just not possible with supermarket bought food.
Foraging for wild food means you can have free, delicious superfoods growing on your door step, without any of the associated food miles, pesticides, herbicides, land given over to a mono-culture, plastic packaging or price tag.
To learn more, and to get up close and personal with some wild edibles, why not join one of my forgoing walks? Link in bio 🌱
