Dried mushroom chili crisp has been on near constant rotation in my lineup of favorite condiments for a couple years now, and, also happens to be the only recipe including mushrooms in my book (it was really hard to separate my culinary loves and write a book on plants, vegetables, nuts and starches, but it…
Prickly Ash
Prickly Ash Sausage
If you harvest your own prickly ash berries (Xanthoxylum/Szechuan peppercorns) sausage should be on your list of things to make. I love the bright, citrusy flavor and gentle numbing quality that prickly ash adds to a dish, but it can be difficult to incorporate them into foods and have them taste coherent if you’re not…
Lacto Knotweed Pickles
One of the best parts about this site I never would’ve imagined as it was hatched when I lived in my friends basement years ago was that I’d be able to talk to people outside of the Midwest. In hindsight, the Internet being, well, the Internet, I should’ve known, but it came as a real…
Szechuan Parsnip Leaf Salad
Parsnips and their relatives like carrots are loved and cherished food plants around the world for good reason: they’re relatively easy to take care of, they can be stored for long periods of time—even over winter, and most importantly, they’re delicious. One thing no one talks about about though is that the leaves are also…
Liver Ketchup
Liver ketchup is another piece of history I came across doing research on lamb and goat in an old Scottish book by An Comunn Gaidhealach (a seriously legit Scottish name) first published in 1907 under the title of The Feill Cookery Book. Like most of the old books I have, a lot of the recipes…
Chilled Melon Curry with Kinome Leaves
I’ve been on a cold soup kick lately at the restaurant. During the Summer, I crave cold and room temperature food. Of course I’ve had tomato gazpacho, but It wasn’t until I tasted Daniel Patterson’s now famous chilled pea soup with buttermilk and nasturtiums that I started to understand the possibilities and thought process of…
Kinome Leaves
In Minnesota and the surrounding area, its too cold for citrus plants to grow, or is it? Prickly ash/Zanthoxylum species is technically in the rue/citrus family. It doesn’t make a fruit like a lemon or lime, but it does make fruit-small, limey tasting berries which are technically wild Szechuan peppercorns, which I talked about previously…
Watermelon Pickles With Zanthoxylum
Old family recipes can be treasured heirlooms. For a while, I got on a kick where I would reinterpret dishes I remembered the women in my family making. To get inspiration, I called my grandma one week and asked her if she had any recipes from Granny Alice (my great grandma), who was always referred…
Wild Szechuan Peppercorns
As someone who’s built his career around food, I’ve tasted plenty of interesting things. Nothing prepared me for the first time I ate wild Szechuan peppercorns though. I got introduced to them through my friends mother, an experienced wildcrafter. On night after dinner, the topic of Zanthoxylum came up, she said it was a plant…
Magic In The Woods
When my friend and photography mentor Chris Bohnhoff asked me if I’d like to do a little mushroom hunting and cooking project with him a couple months ago I was thrilled. He has a sort of series he does involving chef’s and some of their varied talents. Check out some of his other great work…