Customer Reviews

Wild Seasons: Gathering and Cooking Wild Plants of the Great Plains

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This books covers, in exquisite detail, the ins and outs of identifying, gathering and preparing wild fruits and grasses found on the plains. The authors also include wonderful, hard to find recipes, such as wild plum jelly.

Trade paperback, 318 pp, b&w illustrations.

With Appendices on Canning, Freezing and Drying, Other Sources of Information

Indices: Index of Plants, Index of Recipes by Plant, Index of Recipes by Food Category

TABLE OF CONTENTS
Glossary of Botanical Terms
Glossary of Cooking Terms

Watercress
Stinging Nettles
Wood Nettles
Dandelions
Dock
Wild Violets
Asparagus

Catnip
Pokeweed
Lambs-Quarters
Milkweed Shoots
Yellow Wood Sorrel
Pineapple-weed

Wild Roses
Wild Strawberries
Missourie Gooseberries
Prickly-pear Cactus Pads
Cattails
Mint
Day-Lillies
Elderberry Flowers
Horehound

Milkweed
Wild Onions
Mulberries
Purslane
Buffalo Currants
Sandcherries
Juneberries
Milkweed Pods
Raspberries
Blackberries
Chokecherries
May-Apple

Lead Plant
Wild Plums
Wild Grapes
Rose Hips
Prickly-Pear Cactus Fruit
Smooth Sumac
Highbush Cranberries
Elderberry Fruit
Groundcherries

Hazelnuts
Hickory Nuts
Black Walnuts
Pecans
Paw-paws

Buffalo Berries
Wild Persimmons
Jersulam Artichokes

This is the most fascinating review of prairie plants! And the recipes are terrific! Good resource for allergy-sensitive people.

Focusing on the Great Plains, Young, a naturalist at the Chet Ager Nature Center in Lincoln, Nebr., tells us where to find and how to use various plants. ``When I was growing up in Nebraska, many families still used wild plants on a regular basis, and as a child, I helped my mother gather greens in spring and make wild fruit jams and jellies in autumn. When I had my own family, I carried on these traditions,'' she explains. And why? ``Not only are certain wild plants nutritious and tasty,'' she notes, but ``the gathering of them involves the important processes of exploration, discovery and learning. . . . Certainly, garnering part of one's living from wild things creates a keen awareness and appreciation of the natural world and its cycles.'' And so, we learn what to do with stinging nettles: dry them, pulverize them into powder, make noodles from them, or freeze them for future use. With mulberries: bake pies, stew jams, bake cookies; and more of the same for nuts, fruits, vegetables and various plants. Young's book awakens curiosity about the uses of nature, and it also rouses respect--she doesn't want to tamper with wild things, but merely to borrow some of their bounty.