Dave Hughes meets Rupert Waites

Foraging and Flavour David Hughes meets Rupert Waites

Mere steps from the car, in the long, wet grass, my shoes began to breach and are, by now, sodden, my cotton trousers heavy with upward wicking water. Ahead of me, the forestry track along which I squelch, tuft to tuft, drops down into a boggy birch thicket; a most unattractive prospect as the weather, which has not been pleasant at any point in the day, begins to close in once again. Deciding my best course of action is to cut my losses and head home, I clamber the deeply cut bank to my right to shelter a short while in the pine plantation that covers the hill. As I approach, something in the gloomy fringes of the trees catches my eye. The childish giggle I evince is prompted by my proudest discovery to date: a cauliflower fungus, Sparrasis crispa, and an absolute belter at that! Picture perfect, ivory white, fresh as a daisy and— most importantly for an amateur mycologist as comically poor as myself —an easily identifiable edible. I carefully extract my prize and, with much swearing, stumbling and a few close shaves across barbed wire fences, manage to return triumphantly to the van, the 1.5kg mushroom unmolested.

What to do with this treasure, though? Looking to get inventive and in need of advice, I ring up my good pal and forager/chef/flavour expert Rupert Waites, of Buck & Birch. “They’re an arse to clean,” is his first response and, having now experienced the task first-hand, I have a tendency to agree. You'll be crunching on a stray woodlouse or pine needle, for sure, if care is not taken to break it down and wash it thoroughly. Mrs Waites makes an excellent Tom Yum-style soup, where she simmers them a while. They pickle rather well, too. This is why I ring Rupert for advice. If it can be foraged from a Scottish landscape, then he knows the best way to capture its essence. The conversation turned elsewhere: “Where did you find it?” he enquired, casually, but I remained tight-lipped. “The Borders,” was my vague reply. He laughed. I think we all know I won’t be giving up the location of that spot so easily! “You should come out here and see the new flavour library,” he suggested, before we exchanged regards and hung up.

The following day, intrigued by the offer, I venture out to the Buck & Birch development kitchen at Macmerry, in East Lothian, to catch up in person and talk foraging and flavours. I’ve worked with Rupert closely, bottling his array of herbal liqueurs and helping prep the wonderful wild dining experiences he delivers, so I’m familiar with the many shades of culinary wonder that reside in his kitchen. I am not, however, quite prepared for the awe of standing in front of his most recent addition— a literal wall of flavours. Boxes of dried herbs are stacked floor to ceiling. Next to them, shelves filled with brown glass litre bottles containing all manner of tincture and decoction. We have at our fingertips— dried, in tincture and in decoration —everything you might think of that can represent the flavours of Scotland. Barks, plants,

flowers, even the seaweeds and peat that might represent the Scottish landscape. It can be thought of in terms of a colour palette, to add texture and movement to our creations. Angelica root, yarrow, pine needles; they're all very evocative and we’re trying to capture them as a representation of contemporary Scottish flavour. He holds a jar open for me to smell. It is labelled ‘Smoked Kelp’. Just a splash, and you're evoking the sea, salt air and the smoke from cottages. My knees weaken in agreement; the richness an indescribable umami for the nose. Add a bit of sea wormwood, or the tansy you'd find by the beach, and you can practically hear the seagulls.

We drink tea, and while away the afternoon making comparisons between mixing flavours and music; the blending of top, middle and bottom to balance, or to highlight individual elements. A strong bottom note of green hogweed seed can provide an intriguing backdrop to a more familiar dominant flavour such as orange peel. Lovage root will do the same thing. I ask him to talk more about how he builds levels of flavour in his creations and he obliges: At the heart of it is telling the story of the landscapes. You could use oak bark, or cherry bark as a foundation. Very deep, woody, representative flavours. From here, you can build into the florals— tweaking with meadowsweet, elderflower, or rose petals. On top of that, you can season with the bitters, like wormwood or tansy. Mugwort would be an excellent choice, as it has wee notes of everything. Finally, you can highlight with sprinklings of pine needles, or smoke, in a final dusting to add texture, or to tickle the palate. Tell a story without need for urgency. Use basic flavours but make them enigmatic. Play with people's emotions and memory.

The chat is evocative and pastoral in nature. Rupert cites his parents' copy of Richard Mabey's Food for Free as a defining influence in a childhood spent roaming Arisaig and the Isle of Canna. The idea that people flourished, surviving wild on seaweed and what could be foraged from the woods and ditches, was fascinating to me and, as an adult, exploring these environments for flavours became obsessive and bled into my work. Every available space in the household began to fill with bottles and every surface had something pickling, fermenting or drying on it. The latter seems a common household scene among herbologists. I ask him for any advice that I could take away, to start building my own flavour library: Start with single plant tinctures and go from there. This is nothing new. [It’s] all work that's been done before, so there’s nothing to fear in experimenting. We are simply rediscovering the contents of the apothecary cabinet.

Wise words indeed.

Before I leave, I request any final nuggets of wisdom he might pass on to keen herbologists, out foraging in this abundant season. Get comfortable foraging in all landscapes. It’s key if you want to represent them in your creations. All that time spent outside in bad weather, learning what’s out there, can pay dividends later if you remember that one plant that will act as a final lift. Always find new reasons to keep exploring— whether that's going to new places, never repeating menus, making new things, whatever it takes. That's the thing. You'll never get bored with the world of plants. It's endless. And I only concentrate on the ones that are edible!

In the end, I eat the Sparrasis crispa the only way a newly discovered, edible mushroom should be eaten— fried hard in butter and olive oil, taking centre stage on a backdrop of sourdough toast. It’s delicious.

Photos: David Hughes Location: Top Secret, obviously.