Harvest Recipe: Rhubarb Lemonade

We recently had a bounty of rhubarb and I found myself looking for a great way to use it past the usual recipes. When I stumbled across a rhubarb juice recipe, I had to try it. That original recipe was a little bit (okay, a lot!) too sweet for my taste and even my kids […]

mix and match snack cake (gluten free)

Mix and Match Snack Cake (gluten free)

This is another recipe I’m putting online because friends ask me for it so often.  🙂    Here’s an easy, delicious way to use extra fruits and veggies you have on hand and create a fabulous gluten free treat at the same time.  Every time we make it, it has a different flavor since we […]

spring 2020 foraging wrap-up

Our Favorite Early Spring Wild Foods to Forage

It’s only February but we’re impatiently waiting to start foraging wild foods again.  This time of year, when there’s still snow blanketing our Minnesota landscape, I’m already making mental lists of what wild edible foods will be emerging soon and what we want to look for. Here are our favorite wild foods that we forage […]

How to make old fashioned sugarplums

How to Make Old Fashioned Sugarplums

This time of year, our family really loves making old-fashioned cookies and treats — especially sugarplums.  These fruit-based treats are all natural, gluten free, easy and customizable, plus they’re really fun to make with kids. I’m sure everyone has heard of sugarplums at Christmastime (“While visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads” from Clement Moore’s […]

How to Make Easy Crab Apple Cider

So many homes and parks have crab apple trees and so few people put these tasty, healthy little fruits to use.  Here’s a recipe to change all that!  It’s easy, packed with vitamins and antioxidants, and delicious.  It’s also practically free! I came up with this recipe to use up some crab apples that we […]

What to do with lambsquarters

What Do You Do With Lambsquarters?

If you have a garden, chances are that you’ve been pulling up one of the best greens in it for years.  Lambsquarters are a very common “weed” in yards and gardens, but they’re actually a really tasty plant that you should probably get to know! Lambsquarters are also known as lambs quarters, wild spinach, pigweed, […]

The world's easiest and best tasting salsa

The Best (and Easiest) Fresh Salsa!

There’s nothing better when you have fresh tomatoes than homemade salsa — and luckily there’s almost nothing easier too.  Here’s our 3-minute fresh salsa recipe, which is the type of salsa (pico de gallo) you get from authentic Mexican restaurants and so good. Our recipe is adapted from one I found years ago that we […]

You Really Need a Cherry Tree (Plus Easy Cherry Pit Syrup and Liqueur Recipes)

A few years ago, we purchased a little sour cherry tree from some big box store because it was on clearance at the end of the garden season.  That little cherry tree is now a huge, productive tree that we love! It makes the most beautiful white flowers in the spring. And then around July […]

Gluten free pizza crust from scratch

Best-Ever Gluten Free Pizza Crust

Life is too short to eat bad gluten-free pizza, and there’s no reason you have to. Gluten free pizza dough is easy to make at home (it’s even quicker and easier than traditional pizza dough!) and it is honestly delicious. We’ve been gluten free in our family for over eight years now, and pizza was […]

Our 2019 Foraging Wrap-up (elderberries)

Our 2019 Foraging Wrap-Up

Last year was a good year for foraging for our family.  We’ve been using wild foods as a major part of our diet for about 7 years now and it’s become a regular part of our routine for much of the year.  Here’s how it looked for us in 2019. https://www.instagram.com/p/B1yDwnQBsi1/ What was good We […]

Foraged and Home Canned Foods We Eat in the Winter

Making Windfall Applesauce

This article was originally published in Daryl’s Cooking with Kids column at examiner.com in September, 2013.  Some links are affiliate links, meaning we get a small commission on purchases made through our links. Making fresh applesauce is something every kid should get to do. We are lucky enough to know several people with apple trees, […]

Foraging for dock seeds and making dock seed flour

Cooking with Dock Seeds

Dock seeds are prolific everywhere you look right now, so this is a great time to gather them and make dock seed flour.  If you haven’t ever cooked with dock seeds, they’re an easy and healthy source of wild flour to forage. Dock grows as an invasive weed all over the world.  You can often […]

pineapple nettle smoothie

Pineapple Nettle Smoothies

We try to use nettles a lot around here since they’re so healthy, so tasty and grow so plentifully all around us.  One of the kids’ favorite ways to enjoy nettles are in smoothies.  Yes, really! You probably know how healthy stinging nettles are for you, but most folks don’t realize you can use them […]

zucchini fritters (easy, gluten free, vegan version too)

Cooking From the Garden: Easy Zucchini Fritters

Got boat loads of zucchini this time of year?  Here’s a delicious and easy way to make use of them.  Zucchini fritters are kid-friendly and tasty, and the recipe can easily be converted to gluten free (the way we make them), paleo and/or vegan. The recipe is very simple and adaptable, not even really a […]

Trees of Power Review

Trees of Power: A Must-Read for Foragers, Homesteaders and Environmentalists

A somewhat nerdy looking new book was quietly published this year that has the potential to not just greatly improve your life, but greatly improve the world.  I admit that sounds like a bit of hyperbole, but Trees of Power offers a really inspirational look at how the trees that are all around us can […]

Easy two-ingredient sorbet

Easy Two-Ingredient Sorbet (Vegan)

Here’s a super simple recipe that the kids like to make for fruit sorbet.  I even let them make it for breakfast, because they think they’re getting a treat and I know it’s healthy. Just blend frozen fruit (pineapple is a family favorite and what’s pictured here) with sweetened vanilla non-dairy milk of your choice.  […]

Foraging Recipe: Ramp Salt

Wild Ramp Seasoning Salt

Here’s one of my favorite ways to use wild ramps, and you can use it to enjoy the wonderful flavor of ramps all year long.  Dry the leaves and grind them with coarse sea salt for a simple but delicious wild ramp salt.  Simply dry wild ramp leaves until crisp and then put them in […]

Jack's gluten free impossible crust apple or pear cobbler

Jack’s Impossible Crust Apple Cobbler (Gluten Free)

This is a fantastic simple and delicious recipe for apple or pear cobbler where the batter makes its own crust.  Our fifteen year old son, Jack, made it last week and proclaimed that it was his favorite dish so far that he’s baked (which is saying a lot, as the kid loves to bake). We […]

What Foraged and Home Grown Foods Do We Eat In the Winter?

Since next to nothing is fresh in the garden or the wild in winter in this part of the country, this is the time we rely on the root cellar and pantry. Canned, dried, frozen and root cellar foods are all staples for winter cooking for our family, including lots of wild foods we foraged […]

Our 2018 foraging wrap up

Our 2018 Foraging Wrap-Up

This past year was a pretty good year for foraging for our family.  We foraged several hundred pounds of wild foods total, including some that were new to us.  We also foraged quite a nice variety of wild foods and medicinal plants — 35 different kinds! We foraged in our own back yard, in parks, […]

Acorn Spice Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting (gluten free)

Acorn Spice Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting (gluten free)

I brought acorn spice cupcakes to my latest acorn presentation last week, and lots of people have asked for the recipe.  Here it is, excerpted from my acorn foraging book.  This recipe works with either gluten free flour mixes or regular wheat flour.  Most of the recipes in my book are gluten free or have […]

Foraged and Home Canned Foods We Eat in the Winter

Easy and Delicious Summer Fruit Cobbler

Foragers and back yard gardeners often have the happy blessing of buckets of fruit to make use of this time of year.  Here’s a wonderful recipe to make use of blueberries, mulberries, black raspberries, mulberries, peaches, strawberries or any other fruit that you have a bounty of. Sometime around mid-July every year, we pick over […]

Acorn Rice Patties recipe

Recipe: Acorn Rice Patties

It’s acorn season, which means one of the best wild foods out there is abundant and free right now.  Acorn rice patties are delicious ways to make use of acorns and also happen to be vegetarian and gluten free. We usually have dried acorns and acorn flour on hand for cooking all year long, but […]

Easy Gluten Free Zucchini Bread

Easy Gluten Free Zucchini Bread

It’s zucchini season, meaning that even if you don’t grow zucchini you probably have more than enough giant zucchinis to find something to do with.  Here’s a delicious way to make use of it.  This zucchini bread recipe is simple and quite versatile.  You can use your favorite gluten free flour mix or a blend […]

June foraging wrap up

Our June Foraging Wrap-Up

The first month of summer is past now and I thought I’d do a little update on what we foraged in June this year.  This might not include everything, but these were the major foods. Asparagus View this post on Instagram The wild asparagus season is pretty much over. We harvested a total of 57 […]

what to do with mulberries

Wonderful Ways to Use Mulberries

It’s mulberry season!  Whether you have a mulberry tree in your back yard or local park or you have generous friends or neighbors, these sweet treats are all over right now. There are so many reasons to gather mulberries. First of all, they’re incredibly healthy.  Mulberries are loaded with nutrients, antioxidants, vitamins and minerals and […]

How to cook and preserve chicken of the woods mushrooms

What to do with Chicken of the Woods Mushrooms?

We were thrilled when Daryl brought home two big bags of chicken of the woods mushrooms yesterday.  While we harvest lots of pheasant back (dryad’s saddle) mushrooms and morels, this is our first time finding chicken of the woods and I was so excited as I’ve heard for years how much they taste like chicken […]

Make your own homemade fruit leather

Easy DIY Fruit Leather

  Whether you have buckets of wild mulberries or an excess of peaches that you can’t possibly eat in time, fruit leather is a fabulous way to make use of it.  Fruit leather is wonderfully simple and you can customize each batch with whatever fruits you have and flavors you’re craving. Not only is fruit […]

How to easily identify elderberries, elderflowers and elder shrubs

Now Is the Time to Easily Find Elderberry Shrubs!

If you’d like to forage your own elderberries later this summer, now is the time to start looking because elder flowers are blooming (or are just finishing) and the elder shrubs so easy to spot.  Here’s everything you need to know to find elderberries and elder flowers. Whenever people find out that our family harvests […]

Famous herbalists tell the benefits of nettles

What We’re Foraging This Week (5/14)

Minnesota started the foraging season late this year since we had snowstorms throughout April, but we’re now happily doing some major foraging.  Here’s what we’re finding lately. Ramps Prepping ramps for dinner. . . . . #ramps #rampseason #foraging #wildfoodlove A post shared by Alicia Bayer (@magicandmayhem) on May 11, 2018 at 4:08pm PDT Daryl  […]

How to Make Dandelion Syrup

How to Make Dandelion Syrup

Daryl has made dandelion syrup several times with our kids and it’s always a big hit.  Not only is it fun, but the syrup tastes delicious and it’s full of vitamins from the dandelions.  It’s also a great vegan substitute for honey, with a similar color and taste. Although it’s the dead of winter right […]

What’s in Season in February — and What to Eat Local in the North

Lots of fruits and vegetables are in season in February, and it’s still also possible to eat local foods with a little bit of creativity. Why eat foods that are in season?   It pays to eat foods that are in season — to help save money, to help the environment, to get the freshest […]

A Week’s Worth of Healthy, Frugal Organic Dinner Ideas

A Week’s Worth of Healthy, Frugal Organic Dinner Ideas

Wondering what to plan for supper this week?  Here are some healthy, frugal meals you can make if you’re vegan, paleo or anywhere in between.  Even if you buy all organic ingredients, these are meals that are easy on your budget.   1. Soup — Use any veggies, leftovers, grains, meats or beans you have […]

How to Divorce Your Grocery Store

Here’s an easy way to dramatically lower your grocery costs and still eat well.  At the start of each week (or whenever your local stores change their sales), check out the sales flyers for any grocery stores near you.  Only check for grocery items that you either use regularly or would use if they were […]

How to make pumpkin puree

How to Make Homemade Pumpkin Puree

Sure, you can go buy those orange cans of pumpkin puree at the grocery store, but making homemade pumpkin puree is so much more satisfying! It’s also much easier than you might think.  Best of all, this time of year it’s incredibly cheap, even if you didn’t grow your own pumpkins.  My kitchen table is […]

Acorn Ice Cream (paleo and vegan)

Recipe: Acorn Maple Ice Cream (Paleo & Vegan)

I thought I’d share another acorn recipe from my acorn book, in case anybody else has a stash of newly foraged acorns waiting to be put to good use.  This is an ice cream recipe I developed, and like the acorn drop biscuit recipe it is also vegan.  There is a traditional acorn ice cream […]

Acorn drop biscuits

Acorn Drop Biscuits

It’s acorn season, and anybody who follows my Instagram knows that our family has been foraging, processing and cooking with acorns all month.  Acorn processing #fallforaging #forageandharvest #wildedibles #foraging #foragingfamily #septemberforaging #fallflavors #acorns A post shared by Alicia Bayer (@magicandmayhem) on Sep 4, 2017 at 11:04am PDT I made up a batch of acorn drop […]

It's acorn season!

It’s Acorn Season!

Our family has been busy lately with one of our favorite wild edible foods of fall — acorns. Acorn processing #fallforaging #forageandharvest #wildedibles #foraging #foragingfamily #septemberforaging #fallflavors #acorns A post shared by Alicia Bayer (@magicandmayhem) on Sep 4, 2017 at 11:04am PDT Yes, you can eat them, and they are absolutely delicious.  They’re also nutritious […]

Azure Standard's Organic Fruits and Veggies Box

Is Azure Standard’s Organic Fruits and Veggies Box Worth the Cost?

If you don’t have access to affordable organic suppliers like Bountiful Baskets or a good local CSA, Azure Standard is one option to get a monthly box of assorted organic fruits and vegetables.  The box costs $33 (as of August 2017), plus a small delivery fee (generally about $10 for my order of about $120 […]

25 Garden crops to plant in August for your fall garden

25 Herbs and Veggies to Plant in August for Your Fall Garden

If you want to extend your back yard bounty of fresh veggies, now is the time to start your fall garden.   There are many garden crops that can handle some frost and some that can tolerate temperatures well below freezing. Root veggies such as carrots, beets, kohlrabi and turnips actually taste better after some […]

#fyfo100 checklist of 10 ways to afford organic foods

The Top 10 #FYFO-100 Strategies for Eating Organic for Less

I’ll mostly be focusing on 10 main ways to save money on healthy and organic foods in the FYFO-100 series (Feed Your Family Organic for $100 (or less!)). Everybody has different circumstances, so different strategies will be better for different families. You do not need to do all or even most of these to save […]

FYFO 100 Feed Your Family Organic for $100 (or less!)

FYFO- 100: Feed Your Family Organic for $100 a Week (or less!)

Yes, you can feed your family healthy, organic, non-GMO food and not go bankrupt doing it! Welcome to FYFO-100, where I’ll share how we feed our family of 7 for around $100 a week. Every few days, I’ll share more tips for how we make it work. You can go all-in and learn skills like […]

Foraging mulberries with kids

Foraging with Kids: How to Easily Forage Mulberries

Mulberries are some of the greatest wild edibles to forage. They’re nutritious, delicious and easy to gather. Most kids find them irresistible too. Mulberry trees can be found in parks, woods and neighborhoods all over the U.S. and the berries and trees are easy to identify. When you find one tree, you’ll start seeing them […]

10 Delicious ways to use mulberries

(Note from Daryl:  This was originally shared in my urban foraging column on Examiner many years ago.) I shared how to easily harvest mulberries with your kids last week. Now, here are ten great ways to use your haul. A little about mulberries: You can use them in any recipe that calls for berries. If […]