SpringSansai

BY QUINLAN FARIS sansai !

Foraging for wild greens, known as sansai ( 山菜 of Japanese culture and tradition since modern humans first began inhabiting the archipelago. During the Paleolithic Era, people all over the world were foragers, but in Japan foraging culture continued to develop and be passed down through the generations, remaining largely intact even in this postmodern era. Every spring, tens of thousands of people put on long rubber boots and walk up narrow mountain streams picking dozens of varieties of wild greens.

I was introduced to foraging back in 2011 in the mountains of Iwate in a small hot-spring town called Hanamaki. In fact I met a local man, Haruo, outside a hot spring ryokan carrying a basket of wild greens and asked him about them. He kindly offered to show me where I could find them in the mountains and how to cook them. I’ve been going foraging with

Giant butterbur or fuki ( フキ snow melts, these little green heads start poking up out of the ground everywhere. These bake they’re called locally when young, are prepared as tempura or mashed up and mixed with miso to form a paste that is fully mature, these fuki grow into a thickstemmed broad-leafed plant that looks like rhubarb. only a few varieties are edible. When I take visitors foraging with us, they an hour or so of trial and error they get the hang of identifying them.

In this latter stage, the stems become fragrant and very tasty. They are boiled or salt-pickled and served throughout the year at ryokan and traditional restaurants. Fuki have been treasured by people in Japan for thousands of years. The indigenous Ainu people of Hokkaido even have a legend about a goddess who was punished for destroying a human village by being transformed into fuki the people and atone for her crimes. Fiddleheads, or kogomi ( コゴミ not as easy to gather. Every spring we go deep into the Ou Mountains to the northwest of Hanamaki, wading across fronds of ostrich ferns explode up from the ground in moist soil near mountain streams and are one of the most sought after delicacies in early spring. They often hide under piles of dead leaves inexperienced, they’re rather confusing to identify.

Picking them isn’t without danger, however. Often growing right nearby are clumps of torikabuto, known as monkshood in English. If you accidentally grab just a few leaves or part of the torikabuto stem and mix it in with your haul, it will be the end of you! Torikabuto is responsible for a number of accidental deaths in Japan every couple years and has even been used in a few murders! The Ainu were familiar with this lethal plant and ground up the roots—where most of the poison is concentrated—making a paste they poisoned their arrows with. Torikabuto but during the spring foraging season it is more difficult to identify and can be mistaken for an edible plant. That’s one reason why you should only forage with a guide or seasoned veteran.

After the ferns have all opened and the fiddlehead season ends, the next wave is actually my favorite—the twin tara-no-me and koshiabura. These gifts from heaven don’t have any correlates in the West, and thus lack English of new leaves growing from trees that initially are tightly clumped together as they sprout. These trees grow quickly and can be found in a lot of forests that have been logged in recent decades, giving fast-growing young trees a chance to spread. You have seen them along the edge of ski slopes for the same reason.

Tara-no-me are among the most widely recognized and eaten mountain vegetables, and are almost always made into tempura. It has a subtle bitterness and great texture. Koshiabura, my personal favorite, is also mostly enjoyed as tempura but can be paired with salted meat as well. The leaves have a fragrant aroma and unmistakable flavor, also slightly bitter, that is immediately addictive. If you’re in Japan during April or May, you’ll likely izakaya and restaurants as seasonal tempura.

Foraging in Japan can be somewhat dangerous, even beyond the risk of accidentally poisoning yourself. Most bear attacks in Japan happen not to hikers, but rather foragers. In the spring, when most people are out foraging, bears are also stumbling out of hibernation, often with cubs that haven’t yet learned to avoid humans. People foraging for nemagari-take (bamboo

Bears love to eat these tasty snacks as well, and rummaging through thick bamboo grass with no visibility has on countless occasions resulted in a forager literally bumping right into a bear and being punished for it.