BLOGS

Sea lettuce – (Ulva lactuca) – This bright green seaweed grows in thin sheets in the mid-intertidal zone, so it’s easy to pick at low tide.  A very clean tasting seaweed, not fishy, great in seaweed salad or add to ramen, congee or risotto for a colourful note of the sea.  Great firm texture.  Can…

Chaga (Inonotus obliquus ) is a superfood aptly named the ‘gold’ of the forest. Find it growing on older, dead or dying birch trees in BC.  It’s a wild mushroom that’s as hard as a rock, but can be smashed into small particles to make into tea. This is an ancient medicine used by cultures…

Furikake I love harvesting bull kelp, it makes a salty snack with tons of umami. Here are some tips to harvesting your own and one of my recipes for using the blades of the seaweed. Harvest some bull kelp blades, rinse them and dry roast them in the oven at 150F till just brown (er)…

Geoduck are called the king of clams for a reason. When they are eaten raw and fresh from the sea they have an almost crunchy texture and have a briny and slightly sweet flavour. These big beauties are the laughing stock of the sea, but amazingly can go for $60/lb. If you on the Pacific…

By Chef Jane Cornborough (L’Abattoir restaurant) Makes appetizers for 4 guests It’s summer which means Salmon season is here! Pink salmon is perfect for canning and making dishes like croquettes, so here is a recipe that Chef Jane is using for our Aug 2019 summer secret supper featuring an all salmon menu in celebration….

Vancouverites love their berries! Wild blackberries, huckleberries, salmonberries, thimbleberries and raspberries; there are so many in summer it can be exciting for people that love to gather and eat free treats.  My favourite BC berry is the thimbleberry which is like a raspberry but sweeter and more intense. So you know a few edibles, but…

Green figs grow like mad in Vancouver, here’s a simple recipe for Persian style green fig preserves which are traditionally eaten for breakfast with bread, butter and nuts. When you cook figs the flavours really come out as the sugar caramelizes. I’m not one for eating them raw as they just taste like sugar at…

There are hundreds of species of bamboo, all of which are edible. Some are better than others, many species only grow tough, bitter shoots, which must be cooked for a long time to be edible. Black bamboo (Phyllostachys nigra) grows well in our lower mainland (BC) climate and is very tasty, just make sure you…

I’m be honest with you, I’m super picky about fish and chips. I only like thin batters and the best fish (not cod; halibut, john dory or snapper ONLY!). The chips must be fried in beef tallow or duck fat if you want to go really crazy, because I need them to have flavour. If…

Stinging nettles are a nutritious and tasty forest snack, easily found in the forests and by waterways like ditches in BC. They taste a bit like spinach and are packed with the vitamins and minerals that are so good for a body. They grow plentifully and must be harvested in spring with gloves to protect…

Learn how to safely forage for currants.  There are many types of currant plants that common to BC that were eaten traditionally by many First Nations peoples. Black, golden, wax, sticky, red swamp and even stink currant are a few of the varieties.  My favourite is Ribes sanguineum or red flowering currant. You don’t eat…

Fiddleheads are the tasty edible part of a young fern shoot. All curled up in a tight green ball, you pick these delicacies in springtime. In our area (Vancouver), bracken fern and lady fern are the two that are found (ostrich fern is the commercial variety, you can find in Northern BC). Lady Fern fiddlehead…