EPILOGUE: Enjoying lessons learned

After the project described in this blog, we finally got in touch with the local mycological society and it was more that we dreamed it could be. Great folk, and a superb exhibit of mushrooms. There is nothing to beat actually handling edible and other mushrooms, in terms of identification. Pictures can be dangerous. But smelling, feeling and examining the species folks bring in allows one to do a better job identifying in the field. In this picture are a couple mushrooms we purchased (for pocket change) as well as several we collected on a recommended hike AFTER the exhibit. In other words, had I had the chance to go to this meeting of the Snohomish Mycological Society before embarking on my project, I would have been much more successful at tracking down edible species. In the bottom picture is my son with an Amarita Muscarina, which some think is a "magic mushroom." In fact, it is basically toxic and just messes with the mind in the way that Raid sprayed on a cigarette might(I heard this was done with fatal effects in Cambodia a few years ago). But they are cool looking. On the edible end, we became confident in the difference between poisonous boletes and the botellus russellii, which I ate both raw and on top of some pizza. I love it. Raw, it had a nice almost citrus flavor. I also got my first taste of a lobster mushroom and a white chanterelle. Those of you who think mushrooms in the store are boring or lack nutritional value need to get to a market where you can sample such things. If you do, you will find more motivation to learn about mushroom foraging. So I'll consider this one of my favorite byproducts of the experiment documented below.

END: Lessons learned

Weight: 188.2

I didn't make it the full 30 days. I timed things wrong. I went 30 days without paying for food, but toward the end there were lots of food opportunities surrounding a board of directors visit, and I couldn't afford to pass up things like shrimp quesadillas, Chinese buffet, and crab dip. Despite this, I did lose twenty pounds and learned a lot about the edible plants, seafood, and fungi in my region. Sorry to those of you waiting for a heroic effort, but such is the reality. Given the dire economy these days, the experiment was quite valuable, and in addition to self-reflection, I have some observations related to sustaining oneself. I will end my experiment with a list of lessons learned (in no particular order).

1. Oysters fresh from a clean bay are better tasting than anything you can get at a restaurant.
2. All the excitement about edible leafy greens in the edible plant books masks the reality that even if you identify and harvest these, you really need other sources of protein to sustain yourself. The most protein I could find was through the plentiful Amaranth, but it still seemed inadequate without constant pier fishing.
3. I need to try this again during salmon season, but plan in such a way that I can actually stand a chance of catching my limit once or twice with some big fish. The constant fishing for perch was convenient but time consuming.
4. There are lots of immigrant families in affluent suburbia that fish not for the sexiness of the sport but for food. It was great to become friends with my Russian neighbors in particular, despite the language barrier with the adults (the kids chatted with my sons freely).
5. Pollution, whatever your politics, matters for those who want a direct connection to the food of the land. I don't think it would have been healthy for me to accumulate mercury by living off of Puget Sound fish exclusively.
6. King kelp is abundant and edible but tastes bad.
7. Gardens of the size most families tend cannot sustain more than one adult on their own.
8. One needs to consider purchasing whole wheat, and a grinding device, to have flour. Bread became my savior over the month, though I only went through half my bag of flour and half my bag of sugar.
9. If you aren't lucky enough to live where blackberries grow literally everywhere, it is hard to try what I tried. Sorry Arizona friends.
10. Dandelions are everywhere and, when not full of herbicide, are great to eat and especially to stir fry.
11. Nasturtiums are my favorite flower--to eat.
12. One can be a hunter-gatherer only if one does not have a full-time job. Civilization rests on the agricultural practices progressives despise.
13. Killing a chicken loses doesn't seem too hard to do emotionally when you are terribly hungry. I could have wrung a neck had it not been for Mukilteo's prohibition of chickens. (I remember some of my folks' hippie friends realized their regretfully carnivorous desires in a communal setting). Seattle residents can own three hens, and get their eggs. That would be the key to success in this experiment.
14. We do a lot more "numero dos" when we consume lots of processed foods. I never had the gastro-intestinal problems and gassiness I expected. I think, overall, my diet was much healthier than what I had eaten in the August.
15. Making hard cider is pretty easy.
16. Cooperative life is great. Having friends with fruit trees was a saving grace through my silly endeavor.
17. Even if I have to go to the store now, I will supplement my diet with the "free" food around me for the rest of my life.
18. Mushroom hunting is not as dangerous as I thought. You just need careful identification, perhaps a local mycological club to help you identify tough species, and a dedication to eating only species that have few or no poisonous look-alikes.
19. Kids appreciate even strange tasting foods when they have a role in finding and harvesting them. I could never have gotten my kids to eat so much fish and weeds had it not been "fun."
20. Having to hike for food negates even successful forays in terms of net caloric gain.
21. If you try this, be careful to identify things with good tools, don't be reckless, and consider having cultivated potatoes and you will be able to do a better job than I did.

God's peace all. Check back next August and I may try this anew, with better planning, but stricter rules (like no sugar/flour).

Day 24: Boring!

Weight: 191.4

Breakfast: vitamins, plums, apples, pears (my wife made a good apple sauce at least, and though different apples would have made a better sauce it was nice variety)

Lunch: plums, plums, apples, plums

Dinner: apples, nasturtiums, one tomato with salt.

Boring I say!  I would like to thank my sons for eating their bacon, potatoes, cheese, and salsa dinner before I got home. But I did smell the bacon upon opening the front door.  At least I see the home stretch, and we will all be going out for Thai food in six days or so.  I also promised a small class that we'd get an English style "big breakfast" next week to celebrate.

Pictured hear is my family waiting for the Kingston ferry.  I hear that there are some great Coho out there.  The season for salmon in the sound is over, but I'll be on the river before this week is out, God willing.

P.S.: Lots of folk around me have been getting sick.  I expected that at least something would screw me up, digestively or otherwise.  Despite being a bit light headed from a lack of protein and fat, I have not (knock on wood) gotten sick off of anything.  I was particularly worried about the shellfish (dangerous even at a restaurant), but the fresh little invertebrates have not come back to bite me... at least not yet.

Day 22-23: Whidbey Island Plunder

Weight: 192.2

I finally got what I was looking for when I started (minus the salmon victory): shellfish. After the energy I gained from a day of fulfilling (literally) mushrooms, I went on a quest for our exoskeleton-boasting treasure here in the northwest. All day Sunday, I engorged myself on pears and apples. I asked if I could eat a snake or two my friend's son caught, but he turned me down. Just as well, since they were ... cute? But the less-sentient shellfish were not so lucky. For lunch, I ate the best oyster I've ever tasted, fresh off the cold water. Shucked it, and ate its cool, seemingly pollutant-free meat. I am very interested in finding a big oyster bed for this purpose. My grandfather, who used to live in Seattle, would go down to the shore with a shucking knife and horseradish sauce, open the critters up, throw on the nosebending sauce and eat them right there. It was almost spiritual. Then, the kids uncovered some great clusters of very clean looking mussels. I pocketed them and later cooked them up in butter and garlic. I don't think I've had better mussels in my life: whether starving or not. It is amazing how much better fresh shellfish tastes than it does when it makes it to a restaurant. I've had better recipes or preparation, but never better basic meat quality. Later, for low tide, my main man AP and his son G, along with my oldest boy, went down to the shore with shovels and uncovered several clams. We ate them for dinner. Superb. Once again: fulfilling. I am writing on Monday, and I'm sore from the shoveling of wet sand; it was a great workout with decent results. We wished for more but AP said, "I think it was a successful failure of an outing." I agree. Tasty at least.

This morning and through work I kept eating from the big bag of pears and apples we brought back, with generous permission from our friends.

Tonight, for dinner, I plundered my own back yard garden. I ate the last little cucumber, a decent carrot (with top, tasting like parsley), nasturtium, dandelion, and lots of fresh amaranth.

In the mean time, my wife has been occupied with personality tests. She thinks she is a INTJ, and I am an ENFP, with occasional tests showing up as INFP. In my profile, it mentions something about crazy dietary swings. I post this to solicit comment on whether this experiment of mine relates to my Jungian type. My friend's daughter M (age three) was real excited to give me a bug to eat the other day. She is such a free spirit that it may be that testing culinary boundaries play into personality concerns. I tested her boundaries as she collected a big flying insect, and she tested mine as I chomped on it without really being hungry. All in all, I'd like to thank my friends and their kids for helping me stay alive. They've been really accommodating. You know how annoying it is when someone comes to visit and has weird dietary restrictions (e.g., I sometimes visit people during a vegetarian fast)? Well it's pretty dang nice of another family to help me get a dinner that involves trekking through the woods looking for fungus. We couldn't be more grateful for the opportunity to visit our Whidbey friends on the weekends.

Day 21: Mushroom fiesta

Weight: 193

Today I ate more mushrooms than ever, and I never got tired of them. In between soccer for my 6 year old and football for my 10 year old, we took a superb hike behind the local library. After finding whole mini forests of inedible mushrooms, I came across the mushrooms shown here--shaggy mane. I picked the best ones, left some others, and brought them back for lunch. Then, I grilled them with butter (turns out we only went through the first half pint). The other one was hiding in the back of the fridge and it tastes as good as when we first made it. I added lots of garlic from the garden, white pepper, black pepper, sea salt, and a one free onion that a friend had given me. It was by far the best mushroom meal I've ever had.

Then, after the football game, we squeezed into the last spot on the ferry from Mukilteo to Whidbey Island to visit our superb friends. Upon arrival, I tricked our host into taking me to some mushroom hunting spots. None of them turned up anything edible, but lots of interesting fungi. Just when darkness threatened to end my dinner hopes, I found more chanterelles than I needed. After eating every last thing in sight, I only gathered the nicest, cleanest, and largest of the chanterelles. When I got back, I even got my wife and our friends to try some. I used some curry powder. I realized it would be a great substitute for chicken in a curry dish. I will always be interested in gathering a few of those on hikes, even after the experiment. I will go to bed fully sated.

BTW: I have discovered a great deodorant that has no aluminum. I recommend it: Tom's of Maine's Natural Long-Lasting Care Deodorant Stick. It has hops in it. I've tried lots of alternatives to anti-persperant, but this one is a new favorite. That's for all you who are worried about trading smelling nice for memory issues.

Days 19-20: Fish Heads and Hikes

Weight: 193.2

Yesterday, I cheated and had a box lunch when consultants came in to teach about technology. It was a salad though, and I could have gathered roughly the same items at home. Indeed, it was somewhat frustrating that it had lettuce, pears, carrots, and cucumbers--all of which I could have gathered at home, but it did have some walnuts, so a true cheat. This put me on the warpath to prove something. So, that night I went fishing. I was not after perch but something larger, and indeed I got a decent rock sole, a bit smaller than the one my son is holding to the left. I cooked it like fish and chips with some of my rye flour, but had no "chips".

Then today, while my son practiced football, I walked in the rain for a couple hours in a trail tucked away behind our local library. I found lots of inedible mushrooms, including several galerinas (deadly). So it was a mycological bust. But I at least kept my spirits up with lots of wet (from rain) and tasty red clover flowers and assorted berries along the way. The prevalence of blackberies around here makes this too easy. I tried something that looked like an olive, but I shouldn't have since it was not an olive but a berry that I recall was inedible (don't try this reckless method at home) but I only swished it around and spit it out. The whole thing was exhausting and so when I got home I pulled out a whole head of lettuce, and added some tomato mint and nasturtium flower (see pic). That left me somewhat depressed about the lack of strong nourishment. I almost ate a cucumber but it was too small and I'll wait and hope the rain gets it up in size by the end of my adventure.

So, fortunately, I thought ahead yesterday and saved the fish head and spine and tail. I used this to create a fish broth (with some nifty spices from the rack) and a couple pulls of garlic. I then used this broth to boil assorted big greens from the yard, like nasturtium leaves, huge dandelion leaves that I missed earlier, and some spinach that never quite looked good in my backyard. Perhaps I planted the latter at the wrong time or didn't get it enough sun. Who knows, but I do know that the greens in fish broth was worth the work. I am completely sated. Almost over ate. Now, I should start being careful of my fish intake. I will hold off after this experiment on the seafood because I don't want my mercury levels to rise, and I believe the head might contain extra stores of the heavy metals. Nonetheless, I can attest that fish heads make a great soup. I got the idea from a southeast asian friend on the pier. They have a couple traditional dishes I'll try again once I can buy some other ingredients like white wine and rice noodles.

One piece of good news: I felt like a real failure since the whole experiment was undertaken on the assumption that I'd be catching my fair share of salmon. On this side of the sound, with the sea grass and the currents, using my kayak has not been that effective. I hope to go back to Whidbey this weekend but the saltwater salmon season is ended. But again, good news: I found from a student that I can hit the Snohomish river. I have a combo license. I should have known this. In any case, the kayak will work much better on the river, so I will be down there before this is all over. If so, I will end on a high. We shall see. I'm confident in my buzz bomb and I may get back to the fly fishing on the river, upstream.

Day 18: Allergic? Cleanse.

Weight: 194

Note that despite some of my cheats, I have not used more sugar for jam. I did a lot of jamming at the start but not much need now. I had another loaf of bread today but I haven't used up much of my flour and don't think I will if I am successful clamming and foraging this weekend.

Last night, after my post, I realized that I was having the same reaction to the snails as I have had with scallops. This was a real bummer because I was hoping the snails would always be a great fall back in terms of protein. They worked well enough, but I think I had my last garden snail ever last night.

So today, on top of the bread, I went to town on several berries. Some I collected a few days ago and refrigerated, the rest I gathered while waiting for my oldest son to finish his midget football practice. Here's the inventory: blackberries, salal berries, oregon grapes, red huckleberries. I also found some burdock and may stir fry that tomorrow night.

Despite an earlier despair about my garden, I think it will carry me. There are lots of tomatoes and carrots left. I ate my second to last cucumber and there are no more hot peppers, but the carrots are starting to become important since they probably have more carbs than I used to assume. They do me well.

Another cheat: I'm drinking one or two cups of coffee a day. No cream or sugar, just looking for the jolt since I am meeting with guests or students for coffee rather than lunches (as used to be my favorite way to meet). There is a Tully's down the road and I plan to meet three students back to back there.