THE ART OF FORAGING

Over the last decade, interest in foraging has grown exponentially as people seek new, nutritious, and flavourful ingredients, as sustainability advocates explore ways of breaking their dependence on industrial agriculture, and as Indigenous communities and other groups work to revive traditional practices. A growth in interest that has also been noted in Malta thanks to people like Keith Abela better known as Chyna. Delicious recently caught up with Keith to discuss foraging and its recent growth in popularity.

How did you first get into foraging?

I started foraging when I was young with my father. During the season we would go for relatively common things, capers, olives and fennel mostly. But then I spent some time working in Jersey, and there we used to forage various ingredients and I thought to myself if an island the size of Gozo has so many ingredients who knows what malta has to offer. Needless to say once I started studying I found an amazing abundance of local ingredients and I’ve been hooked ever since.

Is foraging a way to connect to the long human history of living off the land?

Yes definitely. Every time I take someone foraging the look on their faces when they find a new product be it fruit, veg, herbs or fungus. I do believe we have a part of our brain that still gives us joy when we reconnect to our primitive urges.

Is foraging inherently sustainable?

If you know what you’re doing, if you understand every ingredient to the smallest detail then yes. But that means everything, you have to ask yourself, does it grow from the roots or does it need seeds ? how many leaves can one take ? when can I pick this ? is it abundant this year ?. if you know all the answers to these questions then yes, but many a time I find people who are eager to learn or beginner “foragers” to be the most destructive thing to nature. I have in fact started cultivating and collecting seeds of local wild edibles, just to help nature a little, I even go out to water wild trees in summer. To be sustainable one must put back what one reaps, to work with and not against nature and our ancestors did.

How did foraging become part of the farm-to-table movement?

It actually predates this farm-to-table movement if you think about it. Look at all the high class mushrooms; truffles, morels, porcini, chanterelles, they’ve all been served in restaurants, taverns and even the tables of nobility for centuries now. With all the technological advances, all the scientific knowledge we have nowadays we still can’t successfully cultivate most fungi, plants or even animals for that matter. So I think it was just natural progression that made chefs look to the wild for rare and delicious things that all add variety to the menu.

Can you talk about the urban foraging scene tin Malta?

Its fantastic to be honest, not that I personally do it myself, but being a forager I always look down. The abundance we have growing out of pavements, in vacant lots and public parks is truly amazing. Take wild cabbage as an example, the amounts that grow out of the pavements its crazy, I find more wild cabbage and caper bushes growing out of pavements, walls and even windowsills then I do in nature.

How can we educate people so that they understand how to forage wisely?

Study, study, study. Get to know everything about the plant, if it grows yearly from the same root system don’t eat the roots. If its leafy greens just pick a few leaves and move to the next. If its fruit leave some on the tree for other animals to eat, we have supermarkets they don’t. In short I have one rule for whatever you’re picking, take a step back through your harvest, take a look at the area, if it looks like you’ve harvested anything then you’ve done it wrong. I only pick around 20% of what’s possible, I never uproot anything (unless its invasive) and if I see seeds I help to spread them around.

Any last words of advice, before we all begin our foraging adventures?

We have a saying the foraging community “everything is edible, most things only once”. So unless you are 1000% positive of what you’re picking don’t pick it. There are hundreds of plants and fungi ready to hurt or kill you so be very very careful and don’t forage just because you think its cool.

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