Foraging Gifts

Mushroom Foraging

A forager encounters death in the woods

'Never go berry pickin' on an empty stomach.'

"Are you a magic mushroom?"

'Apart from that, how did the Autumn wild mushroom picking go?'

Coconut Quest

A Guide to Wild Mushrooms

The men thing...

'Young man, don't pick these mushrooms... They are poisonous and not edible. -Well, I'm not picking them to eat them but to sell them.'

U-pick mushrooms, $1 a pound ...toadstools free!

Mushroom picking on the motorway

The discovery of asparagus.

"You might call it shoplifting officer, but I prefer to think of it as foraging."

'Are these mushrooms or toadstools? And why are you holding the stomach pump?'

The search for cranberries...

"Okay, so we're hunter gatherers. But must you keep singing, 'Here we go gathering nuts in May'?!"

Baby squirrel & Berries

Squirrel with nutcracker

Black Truffles!

"Never mind the porridge, someone's stolen my woodland mushroom collection."

'I'd always been told they found the truffles by smell.'

"You're not supposed to eat the bay leaf."

'I've figured out a workable budget for us, but we'll have to forage in the woods for food on the weekends.'

'I've no time for these foragers - they come into the area and snap up all the best houses...'

'This is my uncle Harry: He made his fortune sniffing for truffles in France...'

The mushroom pickers

True Story: Each year strangers stop to pick mushrooms that grow at the front of our house. They assure us they aren't poisonous - but never return.

An experimentalist alarms his guests by describing the appearance of the mushrooms in a dish they have just eaten.

It's kind of a cross between hunting and gathering --- I calling it "taxing."

"You know, turning a hobby into a job kinda takes all the fun out of it."

"Fools! You're not supposed to *eat* the bay leaves!"

"The inflation isn't that bad. The kids pick berries, my wife picks grass and leaves, and once a month we can afford a loaf of bread."

The Men Thing. . .

"Don't be late - I'm making moldy meat and orange peels over coffee grinds with a side of egg shells."

"Dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, dirt, onion bagel with Nutella and cream cheese, dirt, dirt, dirt..."