Each 2-20 page chapter is devoted to a different plant and meanders its way through its identification, common locations, how to harvest it, and several recipes. This book is a series of delightful short essays by this wonderful old country man sharing his favorite wild foods of North America. It is an easy book to slowly read a chapter at a time. If you are interested in alternative food sources and the environment, I definitely recommend Stalking the Wild Asparagus. I need to get a copy on my shelf before the collapse of civilization because it would certainly come in handy if we had no electricity and limited food sources. On the other hand, he strongly words his chapter about taking care when foraging for wild mushrooms. My only criticism is that he does downplay the challenge of actually identifying some of these plants in the field. Substitute "mini vans" for "station wagons" and this could have been written today. Why? There's nothing smart about eating poor food and getting gypped in the bargain, when nature is offering much better fare for the taking." (p. They feel smugly superior to the rummaging people they passed along the way. Suburbanites "pay exorbitant prices for tasteless greenhouse produce and week-old vegetables from Florida or California, and never realize that they have driven their station wagons past tons of much better vegetables on the way to the supermarket. Stalking the Wild Asparagus has held up very well. Just like Katniss Everdeen from The Hunger Games series by Suzanne Collins, at one point in his teenaged years Gibbons saved his family from starving by providing food from the wild.
Reading it made me eager to try candied acorns. I love oak trees and particularly enjoyed the chapter on acorns. This is a reference book broken into chapters on different wild plants. The whole group enjoyed reading it and we had a great discussion. For example, I learned that the Pecan tree is a member of the hickory family! The author has a familiar, jovial narrative style that was very inviting.
I found it easy to read and full of interesting tidbits.
I didn't expect to enjoy this book very much, but I was wrong. This book was published in 1962 and is rightfully considered a bible of the environmental movement and a primer for anyone interested in healthy, inexpensive eating. We discussed Stalking the Wild Asparagus this month. I run a book group that meets at a local and sustainable foods restaurant.
0 kommentar(er)
