When we purchased our new home, with 16 acres, I was very hopeful that we would be able to forage some free food for our family of seven. There is now a garden with lots of delicious vegetables, but it was very exciting to find a few edible things already growing at our new home. These are the four items that we have successfully foraged, so far!
Black Walnuts
On a fall morning, I noticed these large green fruits falling from the sky while walking the dog. I almost got hit on the head! I figured out that they were Black Walnuts, so we got to work harvesting them.
I used the stomp-with-boots method to remove the fruit around the walnut shell. I used kitchen gloves to pull off as much as that fruit as possible and chucked it into the compost pile. You have to be very careful because they have black juice that has been used as a dye, so it can definitely stain.
I hosed down buckets of shells to finish cleaning them all up. Then, I waited about three weeks to let the shells dry out.
Those shells are tough to break open, so I ended up wrapping the shells in an old (clean) sock, and crushing them with a vice grip. Everything went into a bowl and it took hours, over several days, to pick out all of the nut pieces from the shell pieces.
The nuts are stored in the freezer to stay fresh. They are good, just a earthy version of the regular walnuts you would buy in the store. We used them in Christmas cookies and banana bread.
Maple Syrup
I was so excited to try making our own maple syrup. In the fall, I marked some Sugar Maple trees with bright orange yarn, because I figured that it would be easier to identify them while they still had leaves.
After patiently waiting the next few months, February arrived and it was time to tap our Maple trees. I picked up some metal taps from eBay. We used cleaned out plastic milk jugs and hung them from the taps with some bendable wire.
Our system worked really well. The only issue was needing to regularly empty the jugs because they don’t hold that much. It was a good excuse to get fresh air everyday.
We collected milk jugs in a cooler in the barn for about one week at a time. Then, it was time for the fire. We used some cinder blocks to build an little oven and then used a warming tray on top of that to cook the syrup (greater surface area than a pot). I made the mistake on my first attempt, of only making a moderate-sized fire. It took forever! Later attempts worked better when I made a nice big fire under the warming tray.
It usually took all day to cook down the sap outside. Did you know that the sap is approximately 90% water? Later at night, I would pour the cooked-down sap from the warming tray, through a cheesecloth on a strainer, into a pot. The pot would go inside to be finished. I learned that you have to be very vigilant when watching the temperature of the syrup. I had one batch that went just two degrees above the proper temperature and it turned into Maple Sugar! We still ended up using the sugar, but it was definitely not what we were going for.
In already having jars to use for storage, it cost about $55 for our Maple syrup equipment, and now we’re ready for next year. We ended up with about five 8 oz jars of syrup, and one 16 oz jar of sugar, and it was all delicious.
Wild Violets
In May, I started noticing these little purple flowers all over a section of our woods that I walk with the dog every morning. I used my phone to find out that they were Wild Violets and there were a lot of recipes for using them.
We decided to try out some Wild Violet jelly. It was fairly easy to make, after the kids helped me gather the flowers. The recipe only required flowers, water, lemon juice, and some pectin. Jelly making turned into a cool science experiment, because the liquid changes colors when you add the lemon juice.
We tasted some of it and were all in love! I find it to be a light flavor which almost reminds me of strawberry lemonade. And the next day we went out to pick more flowers. I even was able to make some extra little jars to give out as gifts (assuming we don’t eat it all). An added bonus is that the color of the jelly is just so pretty!
Black Raspberries
These little berries tricked me. Last year, during the home inspection, I saw what looked to be raspberries all over the place. After we closed on the house in August, we were all ready to go and collect tons of raspberries, but there were none to be found. I did find lots of Pokeweed, and assumed that I had been mistaken about the raspberries.
In July, I was elated to find little red berries, and thought that these must be the raspberries. Wrong again. The berries turned black as they ripened, so we ended up having Wild Black Raspberries. They were delicious to pick and eat, and we had enough to make two batches of jelly.
This was the easiest jelly I have ever made, and it does not even require pectin! All you need to do is add lemon juice, cook and squish, and then jar it up (if you don’t mind the seeds). While I still like the Wild Violet jelly better, the Black Raspberry jelly is also very good.
Final Thoughts
Not an advertisement, but Google Lens has been so helpful in my foraging efforts. I am always outside taking pictures of plants and flowers to find out whether we can use them for anything. One thing that has been disappointing is that I can’t find any edible mushrooms. I did find one, but internet searches and my local foraging Facebook group left me uncertain, so I chose not to risk my life on eating a foraged mushroom.
Writing this reminds me of those social media messages with the reminder that, you’re living one of your dreams right now. It’s true, as being able to forage food from our own property was a dream for years. I’m so thankful for this new adventure. We truly are surrounded by abundance, all we have to do is look around.
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