Here are 58 books that The Essential Wild Food Survival Guide fans have personally recommended if you like
The Essential Wild Food Survival Guide.
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I started foraging when I was a toddler and my Greek great-grandmother took me to a park to gather dandelion leaves. I read foraging field guides almost incessantly (still do). Eventually, I got a certification in Ethnobotany and went professional. I love teaching and sharing my passion for wild foods through my books, workshops, and videos. One of the most rewarding moments for me is when a student realizes that something I’ve just identified as a safe and delicious edible is a plant that grows all around them. It’s a game-changer. They can’t go back to seeing any plant as “just a weed."
Like all of Sam’s books, this one is a gold mine of detailed, in-depth information about the plants he features in it. His information is beyond trustworthy: he is so familiar with his subject that it is as if he is inviting you to get to know some of his best friends (the plants). My copy is dog-eared and field-stained from all the use I have put it to.
A guide to 32 of the best and most common edible wild plants in North America, with detailed information on how to identify them, where they are found, how and when they are harvested, which parts are used, how they are prepared, as well as their culinary use, ecology, conservation, and cultural history.
Growing up, I spent summers and weekends with my grandmother, who introduced me to wild food foraging. Grandma Josie and I harvested purslane and lambs quarters weeds from her garden, dandelions and meadow mushrooms from the pasture, and watercress from a nearby spring. On daily walks we gathered peppermint, yarrow, and other wild herbs for tea. She cooked on a wood stove and kept a pot of tea warm at all times. Grandma nurtured my interest in wild plants, wilderness survival, and self-sufficiency. Inspired by her, I built my own stone and log house, teach survival skills and botany, and I still cook on a wood stove just like she did.
John Kallas has rebranded foraging from 'alternative roughage' to 'five-star dining.' No other wild foods book has this kind of in-depth text, mouth-watering recipes, or eye-popping pictures of culinary delights, such as wild spinach pizza, pickled purslane, and homemade marshmallows.
Edible Wild Plants is rich with photographs, giving the reader the tools to be successful early and often at identifying, gathering, and dining on these plants. Based on the experiences of John Kallas, a lifelong, full-time wild food researcher, teacher, and author, it catapults a novice into many early triumphs, provides plenty of new useful and practical information for the seasoned professional, and offers naturalists a resource from which to teach wild food concepts. In no time, readers go beyond just tasting to incorporating these foods into regular meals.
"Wild spinach about 7 feet tall and fully mature. Well-fed wild spinach is well-branched and produces a huge quantity of seeds when mature. The leaves are still edible at this stage but are reduced in quality, taking on a somewhat off-flavor. According to research on other mature plants, the leaves on these older plants retain most of their nutrients and phytochemicals as long as they are still green."
Imagine what you could do with eighteen delicious new greens in your dining arsenal including purslane, chickweed, curly dock, wild spinach, sorrel, and wild mustard. John Kallas makes it fun and easy…
Growing up, I spent summers and weekends with my grandmother, who introduced me to wild food foraging. Grandma Josie and I harvested purslane and lambs quarters weeds from her garden, dandelions and meadow mushrooms from the pasture, and watercress from a nearby spring. On daily walks we gathered peppermint, yarrow, and other wild herbs for tea. She cooked on a wood stove and kept a pot of tea warm at all times. Grandma nurtured my interest in wild plants, wilderness survival, and self-sufficiency. Inspired by her, I built my own stone and log house, teach survival skills and botany, and I still cook on a wood stove just like she did.
Christopher Nyerges has been leading Wild Food Outings since 1974, and his Guide to Wild Foods and Useful Plants is packed full of stories and advice based on personal experiences. For example, he is one of a growing number of people who eat poison oak/poison ivy to build and maintain immunity to it. (Eating poison ivy requires caution, since an adverse reaction could cause your throat to swell shut. Read this book first!) Nyerges describes his own positive experience with eating poison oak, and he offers tips for those without immunity to treat their symptoms.Nyerges lives and teaches in Los Angeles, and the bookcovers the key edible and poisonous plants of the southwest.
An array of abundant wild foods is available to hikers, campers, foragers, or anyone interested in living closer to the earth. Written by a leading expert on wild foods and a well-known teacher of survival skills, Guide to Wild Foods and Useful Plants is more than a listing of plant types—it teaches how to recognize edible plants and where to find them, their medicinal and nutritional properties, and their growing cycles. This new edition features more than 70 plants found all around the United States along with more than 100 full color photos plus handy leaf, fruit, and seed keys…
Growing up, I spent summers and weekends with my grandmother, who introduced me to wild food foraging. Grandma Josie and I harvested purslane and lambs quarters weeds from her garden, dandelions and meadow mushrooms from the pasture, and watercress from a nearby spring. On daily walks we gathered peppermint, yarrow, and other wild herbs for tea. She cooked on a wood stove and kept a pot of tea warm at all times. Grandma nurtured my interest in wild plants, wilderness survival, and self-sufficiency. Inspired by her, I built my own stone and log house, teach survival skills and botany, and I still cook on a wood stove just like she did.
The Encyclopedia of Edible Plants is the only book to list all edible species (about 4,000 plants) that have been used as food by humans on the vast North American continent. The book contains a comprehensive account of each species, including etymology, geographical location, uses of each part, history of the uses, composition, medicinal uses, possible toxicity, endangered species, and much more.
Author Francis Couplan, Ph.D. blended scientific expertise with thirty-five years of personal experience consuming edible plants. By relating to the senses and to the pleasure of discovering amazing new tastes and flavors, the book encourages the reader to develop new relationships with nature.The book also includes traditional Native American cooking techniques and uses for plants which the author recorded while living with various tribes around the country.
A former Catholic, raised in the restaurant business, becoming a Franciscan, and with a passionate love of art, they collectively integrated and came to define my life. I was sent to culinary school. Suffering from a chronic lung condition and obesity, I learned that an animal-based diet was the primary cause and became a vegan in October 1976, regaining my health. Vegan culinary art, as my life’s passion, led me to compete in the International Culinary Olympics five times in Germany, winning Seven medals, including gold, writing for magazines, authoring four books, and working with the United Nations to help humanity improve its health with a plant-based vegan diet.
Dr. Ballantine leads the reader through the transition process and nutritional elements of becoming a vegetarian. In his thoughtful approach, he addresses macro nutrition (protein, carbohydrates, and fatty acids) and the biological impact of consuming meat. I found it interesting how he addresses it, starting with red meat and proceeding on to poultry and finally fish as protein elimination phases to becoming a vegetarian. Radical changes to one’s diet may create biological abnormalities.
Dr.Ballentine’s dietary preference is primarily plant-based, with vegetarianism as the foundational principle. The Greeks, who initiated a vegetarian diet, ate eggs and drank milk. Their objection was the unnecessary killing of animals. Meat and dairy are very acidic (butter is an exception) and can contribute to respiratory congestion which compelled me to become a vegetarian and eventually a plant-based vegetarian..
This book explores the health issues surrounding vegetarianism and helps the aspiring vegetarian make the transition in a way that provides the greatest benefits. Well-researched and easy-to-read, this is an excellent resource for both seasoned and would-be vegetarians.
As writers, we believe that if you have something wonderful to say it needs a beautiful book to say it in. In writing six books together, in the area of herbal medicine and foraging, we have been lucky to find publishers who share our beliefs. How it works is that Julie is our qualified herbalist and a photographer, layout, and typesetting specialist, while Matthew is a professional editor, writer, and compulsive compiler of bibliographies and indexes. Our USP is that we insist each plant deserves a recipe or two, and that we feature many forgotten wild plants from the old herbals that we love to bring back to life.
We value this book because it is alone in giving equal weight to the foraging (for eating) and medicinal values (for health) of thirteen super-abundant survival plants.
We love its breezy but informed tone, its original recipes, and its underlying serious ecological purpose. What we found somewhat irritating was the twee little verses that introduce each plant: these are groan-worthy! But that’s the only and slight criticism, and we love to follow Katrina for fun and very well-informed foraging!
The Wild Wisdom of Weeds is the only book on foraging and edible weeds to focus on the thirteen weeds found all over the world, each of which represents a complete food source and extensive medical pharmacy and first-aid kit. More than just a field guide to wild edibles, it is a global plan for human survival.
When Katrina Blair was eleven she had a life-changing experience where wild plants spoke to her, beckoning her to become a champion of their cause. Since then she has spent months on end taking walkabouts in the wild, eating nothing but what she…
I started foraging when I was a toddler and my Greek great-grandmother took me to a park to gather dandelion leaves. I read foraging field guides almost incessantly (still do). Eventually, I got a certification in Ethnobotany and went professional. I love teaching and sharing my passion for wild foods through my books, workshops, and videos. One of the most rewarding moments for me is when a student realizes that something I’ve just identified as a safe and delicious edible is a plant that grows all around them. It’s a game-changer. They can’t go back to seeing any plant as “just a weed."
Steve’s funky sense of humor and obvious love for the wild foods he describes make this book a classic. It is especially useful for urban foragers in the Northeast. Anyone who has ever been on one of Steve’s foraging tours will recognize the playful way he delivers essential botanical information. And that playfulness makes the information memorable.
Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants in Wild (and Not So Wild) Places shows readers how to find and prepare more than five hundred different plants for nutrition and better health. It includes information on common plants such as mullein (a tea made from the leaves and flowers suppresses a cough), stinging nettle (steam the leaves and you have a tasty dish rich in iron), cattail (cooked stalks taste similar to corn and are rich in protein), and wild apricots (an infusion made with the leaves is good for stomach aches and digestive disorders).
As writers, we believe that if you have something wonderful to say it needs a beautiful book to say it in. In writing six books together, in the area of herbal medicine and foraging, we have been lucky to find publishers who share our beliefs. How it works is that Julie is our qualified herbalist and a photographer, layout, and typesetting specialist, while Matthew is a professional editor, writer, and compulsive compiler of bibliographies and indexes. Our USP is that we insist each plant deserves a recipe or two, and that we feature many forgotten wild plants from the old herbals that we love to bring back to life.
This book is our go-to reference for any new wild food plant and still our favourite food foraging book of all, even though it’s over 40 years old. It has the best photographs (often of the author’s amazingly set-up food shots), the biggest range of worldwide edible wild plant foods (including mushrooms and seaweed), and the most informed, comprehensive text.
It is the book all foragers aspire to have written and we are very grateful to Roger for having done it so well already!
I started foraging when I was a toddler and my Greek great-grandmother took me to a park to gather dandelion leaves. I read foraging field guides almost incessantly (still do). Eventually, I got a certification in Ethnobotany and went professional. I love teaching and sharing my passion for wild foods through my books, workshops, and videos. One of the most rewarding moments for me is when a student realizes that something I’ve just identified as a safe and delicious edible is a plant that grows all around them. It’s a game-changer. They can’t go back to seeing any plant as “just a weed."
Written by my mentor the late, great Gary Lincoff. This book teaches how to safely identify and prepare wild edible mushrooms, but it does much more. Gary includes fascinating stories about how different cultures relate to mushrooms (from mycophobic to can’t wait to get out there and hunt for them). I’ve tried many of the recipes, and they are excellent. He also includes medicinal mushrooms, and (important!) a guide to the poisonous mushrooms you definitely want to avoid.
Mushroom guru Gary Lincoff escorts you through the cultural and culinary history of the mushroom, hunting and identifying wild mushrooms, mushroom safety, and on to preparing and serving the fungi.
Stunning photographs and Lincoff's fascinating anecdotes from the field will make you an instant mycophile.
Gathering edible wild food is a wonderful way to forge a connection to the Earth. Mushrooms are the ultimate local food source; they grow literally everywhere, from mountains and woodlands to urban and suburban parks to your own backyard.
The Complete Mushroom Hunter, Revised will enrich your understanding of the natural world and build an…
As writers, we believe that if you have something wonderful to say it needs a beautiful book to say it in. In writing six books together, in the area of herbal medicine and foraging, we have been lucky to find publishers who share our beliefs. How it works is that Julie is our qualified herbalist and a photographer, layout, and typesetting specialist, while Matthew is a professional editor, writer, and compulsive compiler of bibliographies and indexes. Our USP is that we insist each plant deserves a recipe or two, and that we feature many forgotten wild plants from the old herbals that we love to bring back to life.
We admire this new book by the acknowledged expert on North American edible plants. Sam Thayer’s astonishing field guide is handy in size, a laminated paperback with lovely rounded corners, full of beautiful illustrations and maps, covering most of eastern North America and including over 700 edible plant species.
It is superb on botanical, medicinal and culinary dimensions, and is also fun. How can you resist an author who offers both a ‘regular old boring index’ and ‘the best index (in the author’s opinion)’, which lists, for example, the best herbs to make teas, string or wild spices, the best-kept foraging secrets and the best things to avoid feeding a first date?
Eastern North America is one of the richest foraging landscapes in the world, with a wild abundance of fruits, berries, nuts, roots, tubers, shoots, flowers, seeds, and leafy greens. This guide is the key to unlocking the nutritional and culinary secrets of the natural bounty around us. As the most comprehensive regional guide ever written, it contains detailed descriptions, range maps, and sharp color photos of 675 edible species as well as some of our most troublesome toxic plants. Sam Thayer's Field Guide pioneers a novel identification system using everyday language accessible to beginning and advanced foragers alike, designed to…
