Review of Previous Courses
Autumn Wild Food Course September 2007
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The Indian Summer had certainly arrived and a gorgeous weekend of sunny weather warmed the cockles of September's Autumn Wild Food course participants.
Dan Watson, Rob Pickering and Liz Murphy ran the weekend course with a seasonal food focus at the base camp in Old Wives Wood, Wharfedale, North Yorkshire.
The nine course participants were a great mixed group of differing ages, they also had a range of experience in woodland and kitchen environments which meant they were able to learn from one another too. Everyone enjoyed a packed weekend of food preparation and cooking techniques as well as trying their hand at other useful camp and craft skills. The plant id and food foraging walk turned up a great wild larder available within a short distance from basecamp and some interesting surprise foods too!
Topics covered included:
- Fire craft for cookery
- Techniques for catching, preparing and cooking game
- Seasonal hedgerow foraging
- Techniques for catching, preparing and cooking fish
- Seasonal plant/fungi id walk and cookery
- Preserves and syrups for autumn fruits
- Construction of an improvised backwoods oven & smoker
- Backwoods baking, game stews and pies, fruit crumble and campfire breads
These were some of the fantastic meals prepared and devoured:
- Pheasant and crab apple casserole with baked potatoes cooked in the fire.
- Bacon and bannock breakfast
- Rabbit burgers barbecued on the fire
- Trout stuffed with hedgerow herbs
- Ponnassed salmon hot smoked over the fire served with lemon, sorrel, roasted onions and corn on the cob.
- Appetizer of rabbit kidneys and liver flambeyed in chanterelle vodka
- Game stew with elderberries and a baked cobbler topping
- Apple and blackberry crumble with cream and Autumn berry syrup
Dan & Richard's hedgerow bar was brought out at suppertime on the first evening providing a taster of tipples such as oak leaf wine, blackberry vodka, plum wine, elderflower wine and a few more besides!
‘‘The course gave me a chance to harvest a hedgerow, prepare game and cook outdoors. It was great to set up camp in a woodland setting and shut the world out for a weekend, great course and instructors.’’ Paul Fieldhouse, course participant.
‘‘Staying in a woodland was magical. I really enjoyed seeing how much wonderful food can be simply produced in the middle of a wood - much more gourmet than I was expecting. I find I look at the countryside with new eyes - what can I eat? what can I use that for? Is this good for lighting a fire?......... I am pleased to have overcome my aversion to the idea of camping and the difficulties of hygiene in a wood. I was most impressed with the lack of any unpleasantness around the trench loo. The experience has increased my confidence to tackle new situations.’’ Liz Blackledge, course participant.
Wild Food Courses May 2006
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Have you ever wondered what salad plants you can pick and eat on your walks in the countryside? Have you ever prepared and tasted succulent rabbit-burgers grilled on a barbecue in the woods or smoked your own trout fillets in a back-woods smoker?
Dan Watson (North of England Agent), Rob Pickering and Liz Murphy ran three two-day courses in preparing and eating wild food at a Woodlands.co.uk wood at Wynyard in County Durham in May.
The course base camp was in the heart of a 500 acre ancient mixed broadleaved woodland with the working area in a beech and birch glade close to a stream.
The 22 course participants bared up well in the dreadful May weather and thoroughly enjoyed learning camp craft skills such as building different types of cooking fires, knife work, spoon carving and cord making as well as dealing with (and eating!) a wide range of wild and camp foods including:
- Bannocks & breads.
- Edible salads from the hedgerow.
- Trout, Salmon and Sea Bass preparation & cooking methods.
- Game preparation & cooking methods for Venison, Rabbit, Pigeon.
- Woodland quiche
- Backwoods oven & smoker
- Fruit syrups & crumble
- Building a Hangi oven (a hot rock cooking method) for a communal feast
Classic hedgerow beverages such as nettle beer, raspberry vodka and oak-leaf wine were also sampled to ensure that a thoroughly merry time was by all!
‘‘We gorged ourselves on this gourmet weekend, it was great to get in touch with real food I prepared from scratch and ate outdoors. I came away feeling inspired and confident to find and eat more wild food in the future’’. Robin Meetham, course participant.
