Forest Park
Sunday, April 27

Forest Park is one of the best places for foragers in early spring. It boasts a large, mature secondary growth forest, trail sides thickets, and cultivated areas, all overflowing with wild plants.

Now is the time for roots: Burdock, an expensive detoxifying herb sold in health food stores, abounds near the playgrounds we'll be passing as we begin the tour. The cooked root tastes like a combination of potatoes and artichokes. Nearby, we'll find honewort, an herb with a flavor similar to parsley.

Sassafras, on the other hand, grows in open places in the woods. It tastes like root beer, which you make from the taproots. The black birch tree, of birch beer fame, is a common forest tree that tastes like wintergreen. The twigs, which you can chew, make a delicious non-steroidal anti-inflammatory herb tea.

Another root we'll look for along the park's paths is the tuber of the hog peanut, with a flavor akin to raw peanuts.

Everyone will also find plenty of leafy green vegetables, such as chickweed, which tastes like corn, hot-sweet daylily shoots, parsley-flavored goutweed, pungent garlic mustard, roots with their garlicky leaves, mild flavored violets, and spicy field garlic on this tour.

Early spring shoots will be at their peaks. We'll be finding false Solomon's seal, which tastes like asparagus, and Japanese knotweed, with a sour flavor akin to rhubarb.

With lots of rain and a bit of luck, gourmet oyster mushrooms and enoki mushrooms may also be emerging from trees and stumps. We'll be so busy foraging, the 4 hours will be gone before we know it!