FOOD & DRINK
Foraging for dinner
Can some of the Island’s wild plants lend themselves to recipes that have gastronomic qualities as well as being ..er… edible? We put Kazz Padidar (forager) together with Claire Allenet (head chef at The Potato Shack, Woodlands Farm and owner of 'Nourish'), to see how Claire might use some of Kazz’s foraged plants. By Alasdair Crosby
W
hen the Day of the Triffids dawns, when the Kraken Wakes, when oil ceases to flow or a worse pandemic brings normal life to a halt and the supermarket shelves are bare of purchasable food… in short, when civilisation As We Know It ends whatever your favourite apocalypse, Kazz Padidar is likely to be your man. Put him in a field, and he’ll eat the plants, doubtless to the annoyance of the rabbits and pheasants when they realise he’s got their food before they have had a chance of tucking in. Foraging has always been his passion, and it is something that he still does regularly, teaching the public about local edible plants in the course of what he calls ‘Wild Walks’, mainly from the Kempt Tower area in St Ouen inland and uphill towards Mont Grantez Dolmen. ‘The countryside can provide us with things that are edible and sustainable - so that you don’t have to depend on supermarkets!’ Wild fennel, field mustard, nettle, wild carrot, hogweed, dog rose for rosehip, shylock, black mustard, sorrel, plantains, chickweed, pennywort, spring beauty, jew’s ear mushroom, lemon thyme, wild clary sage, wild mint, alexander, mugwort, yarrow, borage, wild horseradish, hawthorn, gorse buds… the list is endless.
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