A forage down Chorlton Ees in the spring promised much abundance – sooner rather than later as we came to see. A mere couple of steps from the car park and we happened upon a small patch of edible greens that, like most things we discovered, had amazing healing properties as well as being nice to eat! Jesper Launder is a qualified herbalist as well as wild food guru and he gave us a very good insight into wild food – as well as allowing us plenty of time to take pictures and write notes. This, I came to see, was important – particularly when identifying mushrooms. We lucked out with the time of year, managing to find the St George’s Mushroom, but Jesper also pointed out potentially dangerous other varieties. Fortunately, the St George's Mushroom is not easy to confuse. To this, we were able to accumulate horseradish and many other kinds of leaves. Back at base, Jesper cooked up some wild St George’s Mushrooms and we even had dessert – Stewed Japanese Knotweed with Greek yoghurt (courtesy of the corner shop, not Chorlton Ees!), all washed down with some superb Japanese Knotweed wine – a great way to cut back some of what is a voracious plant. Well worth all of the effort!
More of Jake's photos can be seen on our Facebook page.
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