Food for Free (Collins natural history) [Paperback]

‘Thirty years after its initial publication, the forager's bible continues to inspire and enthral.’
Scottish Field

‘Still a classic’
The Financial Times

‘Armed with this guide, this month you could be sampling the simple pleasures of eating a fleshy Hottentot fig straight from a Devon clifftop, making elderflower fritters gathered from the hedgerows, or frying fairy-ring champignons picked off your lawn. With its charming painted illustrations, it is a book to savour in itself.’
Devon Life

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

This guide to Britain's wild foods, first published in 1972, reflects ever increasing ecoawareness and popular interest in finding different, and more natural, sources of food. This book opens up an abundant storehouse of free wild food, of powerful and surprising flavours preserved intact in the wild stock whilst increasingly missing from the bland and pre-packed goods found in shops. Each of the 240 types of fruit, nuts, flowers, seaweed, fungi and shellfish featured has its own field identification notes.

COLLINS NATURAL HISTORY

First published 20 years ago, 'Food For Free' dramatically changed the attitude of the British public to the riches of the countryside. No longer were wild berries, seafood and fungi regarded with suspicion, but with gourmet enthusiasm. For the highways, byways and waterways of this country offer an abundance of food that is both delicious and free – and this book is the wild food foragers' bible. Since its first appearance, it has expanded to include many readers' traditional family recipes for hedgerow jams, wild raspberry vinegar and fruit liqueurs. And every single species covered – over 240 of them – is now illustrated in colour and has its own field identification notes, along with advice on where to find what, guidance on picking and preparation, culinary and nutritional tips.

"An exceptionally pretty book which tells us how to live off the land."
SUNDAY TIMES

"Richard Mabey turns the prospect of a country ramble into a gastronomic outing. It is a well-researched, enthusiastic book that's a pleasure to own"
LANCASHIRE EVENING TELEGRAPH

Richard Mabey is a naturalist and award-winning author and journalist. He won wide acclaim on the publication of the original Food for Free in 1972 – which has never been out of print since – and again with the publication of the colour edition in 1989. Among his many other acclaimed publications are Gilbert White (Whitbread Biography of the Year) and the ground-breaking bestseller Flora Britannica, which won the British Book Awards' Illustrated Book of the Year and the Botanical Society of the British Isles' President's Award and was runner-up for the BP Natural World Book Prize. He collaborated with Mark Cocker on Birds Britannica, and his book Nature Cure, described as 'a brilliant, candid and heartfelt memoir', was shortlisted for four prestigious prizes: the Whitbread Biography, the J.R. Ackerley for autobiography, Mind (for its investigation into depression) and the Ondaatje for the evocation of the spirit of place. He is an active member of national and local conservation groups and lives in Norfolk.