How to Start Foraging, According to TikTokers

There are more than 400,000 species of plants on Earth and at least half are suitable for human consumption—yet you’ll only find a small portion at the grocery store. That’s part of the reason why Sam Thayer loves foraging. He started collecting wild food from the woods when he was a kid, and he still has cravings for delicacies he can’t buy. “Last year I gathered about 30 gallons of serviceberries”—blueberry-like fruits that grow on trees and shrubs—“and I make fruit leather and eat it as a snack year-round,” says Thayer, a naturalist who lives in Northwest Wisconsin and has authored an array of field guides. “I have about 8 pounds of Wapato, which is a tuber, in my pantry, and I grind it up into hot cereal for breakfast. I love it, and you can’t buy it.” [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Foraging spiked in popularity during the pandemic, when people who felt unsafe going to the store discovered it was a fun way to collect healthy, nutrient-packed food from the great outdoors for free. It’s possible to forage in all sorts of places, even cities: Thayer recalls an excellent salad he made out of leaves plucked from trees in Washington, D.C. For all these reasons, foragers have found a home on TikTok, where millions of people watch videos explaining how to harvest puffball mushrooms, gather and process black walnuts, and make wild violet syrup. We asked a few of TikTok&rsquo...
Source: TIME: Health - Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Tags: Uncategorized Evergreen healthscienceclimate Source Type: news