Natures larder

These uncertain times have brought the fragility of the mechanisms which support and sustain us into sharp focus. It's said that we're only nine meals from anarchy, and I think that'd be a fair assumption. Hyperbole? Maybe. Although the fabric of society is already worn thin, with derision and division common as the façade of civility slips. There are several scenarios I can envisage where a knowledge of wild food resources and where to acquire them becomes invaluable. That in mind, I try as often as possible I to utilize wild food resources when they present themselves; not only do they make a welcome addition to the pot, engaging the foraging muscle also helps to keep it sharp. Today's find, a tidy clump of Oyster Mushroom (Pleurotus ostreatus); a common fungi found throughout the year on deciduous trees (in my experience, beech), especially after rains when you'll regularly find sprawling assemblages of them; a good edible, and one that's difficult to misidentify (never collect any wild food you're not 100% with). Until relatively recently an understanding of natures larder would have been commonplace, learnt in childhood and utilized through life, as had their ancestors into the mists of time, a lineage unbroken; not so much now though.