At this time of year Nature appears to be still, sleeping perhaps. It’s a quiet month for gardeners and foragers alike but those who take time to look a little closer are delightfully rewarded with sweet promises of Spring Read more

Spring has sprung and with it comes one of the edible plants for the forager, wild garlic (Allium ursinum). Most people who have dabbled in foraging will know wild garlic (or ramsons) as a great plant to start with as it’s simple to recognise and use in cooking. It’s one of our absolute favourite wild foods.… Continue reading 11 easy wild garlic recipes Read more

Every so often something happens that punctures our sense of what’s normal. In the UK one of those events was empty shelves that used to display fruit and veg. Then supermarkets began rationing some food items. Read more

We like the idea of rewilding, but it needs much more thought when it removes good UK lowland farmland – because then, obviously, land elsewhere will have to brought into agricultural production to take up the slack. Read more

A celebration of local, seasonal soft fruit and the memories that it can evoke. Read more

With the UK’s egg shortage continuing, The Vegan Society shares top egg alternatives for everything from cakes to scrambled eggs. As the cost of living and the avian flu outbreak continue to impact the farming industry, egg producers are having problems meeting the demand for eggs, resulting in a shortage here in the UK. The… Continue reading Getting around the egg shortage – The Vegan Society’s top alternatives Read more

George Monbiot has joined a campaign called ‘Reboot Food’, working with techno-utopians who would like to see governments remove support for organic food and deregulate the GM industry, as well as producing bacteria-based food in giant factories (‘precision-fermentation’), and getting rid of smallholdings. Read more

Another critical review of George Monbiot’s latest book, Regenesis, by Chris Smaje, author of Small Farm Future. This follows on from last week’s review by Simon Fairlie. Read more

Simon Fairlie starts a series of articles about whether technology will save us. He supports small farmers over George Monbiot’s ‘Regenesis’ solution. Read more

Recipes for the humble nettle. Read how to pick, choose and cook with this overlooked plant. Read more

Aldegarden is a wonderful site in Suffolk, with accommodation, a community pub, and a ‘glamping’ site with yurts, timber structures, a cob roundhouse, gypsy caravan and a converted barn, communal areas, solar hot water and electricity and compost loos. They’ve been in our directory for years. But now they’re looking for new owners for the property and successful businesses. Read more

How to cook your homegrown quince! Read more

To make cider vinegar we need to start with a fully fermented dry cider with a minimum 5% alcohol content. Sulphur dioxide should not have been added for storage, because this will inhibit the conversion to acetic acid. Read more

A fast synopsis and gentle reminder of the power and necessity of incorporating raw foods in your diet for health and vibrancy… Read more

Here’s a recipe for savoury muffins using wild garlic and nettle tops that can be foraged in many places at this time of year. Read more

Apple juice is in some ways more difficult to make than cider, and indeed it can scarcely be regarded as a traditional product at all. Until the recognition late in the 19th century that fermentation was caused by yeast converting sugar into alcohol, the difference between juice and cider was somewhat obscure and of little practical importance in any case. Read more

Sometimes, I wish I didn’t know the backstory to some foods, so I could happily buy them at the local shops and not think twice. But I do and here is my list of foods I won’t be buying again plus others that will require careful buying choices. Read more

First let’s be clear. I’m not talking about Brussels sprouts! I’m referring to different types of sprouts. I’m referring to the tiny white shoot (primary root) that emerges when a seed, bean or grain begins to germinate and begins to grow into a vegetable. Read more

Here’s the third and final part of my interview with Caroline Bennett, founder of ‘Sole of Discretion’ (a community interest company that sells fish caught by a collective of small fishing boats in Devon) about why we should support small fishing boats over giant super-trawlers. We’re talking about how government quotas benefit super-trawlers and disadvantage… Continue reading Why we should support small fishing boats over super-trawlers, Part 3 Read more

Here’s Part 2 of my interview with Caroline Bennett, founder of ‘Sole of Discretion’, a community interest company that sells fish caught by a collective of small fishing boats in Devon. Here we talk about the life of small fishing boat skippers. Read more