An official challenge to those who love Kombucha!
Thanks for checking back!
We are excited to bring yet another video with Wild Foods expert Arthur Haines!
This information, for me, was particularly fascinating, and I think the same is true for Arthur as well!
For centuries people have been enjoying the health benefits of the fermented beverage Kombucha, which is often mistakenly referred to a Chinese Mushroom Tea. In truth, Kombucha, which most likely hails not from China, but from Russia, is tea that has been fermented by a “SCOBY”. This is an acronym for a Symbiotic Colony Of Yeast and Bacteria, the strange pancake like colony of organisms that float on top of the ferment.
Typically the Kombucha begins with a steeped tea (literally the Tea plant “Camellia sinensis”) and white or “unrefined” cane sugar. The SCOBY, often called the “Mother” is placed into the tea where it (the yeast and bacteria) ferment the feed on the sugars and phytonutrients of the tea, fermenting it into the drink we call Kombucha.
For years I have been told that the Mother required the caffeine from the tea plant, as well as the Sucrose from the sugar. I have seen small Kombucha projects where honey, agave, and other alternative sugar sources have been used, but they ultimately are less functional than sucrose. The flavored and herbed Kombucha we see on the market is made first with tea, and then is infused with other plants after it is fermented.
Arthur has discovered a method that bypasses both the Tea plant as well as the Refined Sugar! What he shares here is a truly Wild food, fully medicinal, and even better tasting than what I was used to!
So, this is an official challenge to the Kombucha producers and communities to up their game!
Have a look and let us know what you think!!! ~Daniel
Oh, almost forgot! Special thanks to Lauren Kinsey, who posted a really valuable comment after seeing the last set of videos with Arthur. I had mentioned that wild plant harvesting by humans can actually benefit the ecosystem. In a portion of her response Lauren’s says “I don’t understand how harvesting wild food can “benefit the ecosystem”.
I really appreciated her stepping up to ask because I know that I (and much of my generation) was raised to believe that we are inherently, by our very nature, damaging to ecosystems. This way of seeing the world is very much in vogue today. Arthur shares a very eloquent response;
“It does at first seem like an odd statement that collecting wild plants can actually benefit the ecosystem. But Daniel’s statement is factual. It may be hard to perceive because we simply don’t interact with wild plants as traditional cultures did, which means we lack the knowledge base to understand our role in the ecology of these organisms. Further, we have been taught to “take only pictures, leave only footprints.” This well-intentioned phrase has created a populace that no longer uses and cherishes wild species. Consequently, many do not understand their true value.
There are so many examples of beneficial human interaction it is hard to know where to begin. Consider species such as evening-primrose, a colonizer of open, disturbed places that has an edible taproot. When we gather this root, we kill the plant. However, we also till the ground when we excavate the roots, disturbing the soil and maintaining an open area–which is absolutely necessary for this species. Without repeated disturbance, the area will eventually grow in with taller plants that will shade out the evening-primrose, leading to a loss of that species at that site. When we gather edible seeds and seed-like fruits, we unintentionally scatter or drop some of them, helping the plant to disperse further than it would have otherwise. Native American practices have been shown to increase the abundance of certain species even though lethal collection was being performed. They utilized many traditional practices to ensure plants were not eradicated. Simply gathering bulbs after the seeds had formed would allow the plant to germinate in freshly tilled earth.
We really do need a shift away from the current paradigm of a hands-off approach to nature. This “look but don’t touch” attitude toward nature has been applied too extensively, and many mistakenly believe that all wild beings are better off without any human interaction. However, there exist many examples showing that conscientious use of plants by people is beneficial for those species. Further, experientially learning the uses of wild plants teaches people to value those species while also helping them to become more self-sufficient.
The simultaneous use and conservation of nature requires far more knowledge and skill than simply leaving nature alone. What might appear on the surface to be a wanton act of collection actually represents a gathering system that includes numerous safeguards to protect plants from overharvest. Abstract learning about nature (i.e., learning that doesn’t involve interaction and use) doesn’t accurately portray the value of different species. Without this knowledge, the need to preserve species can’t be fully appreciated.
Best wishes,
Arthur Haines
Wild Elixirs of the Native Americans!
This is Wild Food expert Arthur Haines showing us his method of making the indigenous North American wild hickory nut mylk elixir!
I really love the devices he uses to process the foods he Wild Crafts.
Many are hand made and quite intentional in their design and function.
The Mortor and Pestle Arthur is using here is incredibly functional, and makes most kitchen Mortors look somewhat silly by comparison. This is the size that I think is most functional for actual use in any traditional setting. Years ago while traveling in South East Asia I noticed Mortors made from stone that were nearly this exact size, and they were used daily in the households of people there.
The ones that we keep in our kitchens today are usually just decorative, or at best are for small novelty jobs. Wild crafting medicinal herbs and wild foods on any significant scale means obtaining or creating some innovative tools for processing your produce!
One thing you can sense as Arthur talks is his deep grasp of the nutritional components of the wild foods he discusses. There is a vast difference between understanding the basic survival foods needed to stay alive while stranded in the woods, and fully understanding how the local indigenous peoples thrived on the foods of their eco-ranges for countless generations.
This awareness makes all “diets” look like unsustainable fads. If you remove the neurotic nutritionism disorders that are plaguing humanity, there would really only be two significant diets to choose from… Agrarian (domestic foods) or Gatherer/Hunter (wild foods). Or of course some composite of the two.
“Modern” man is almost, with little exception, exclusively Agrarian today. Unlike Agrarians of the past, he seems to be weakening and poisoning his food supply with a near total irreverence.
Today the world wide commercial mono-crop farming practices all around us are raising varieties of weak-gened domesticated food hybrids in conditions so toxic as to make them very unattractive as food options. These are most often processed into nutrient deficient edible caloric non-foods. This of course continues to weaken us just as it does our offspring and ultimately our species genetics.
Well grown Local Food is beginning to gain a foothold, though in much of the world it has become increasingly more interesting to find food from local organic growers. Real, well grown local heirloom food appears scarce here in society at this time in history.
And yet Wild Food remains as nutritious, as tonic, and as much a delicacy as ever!
Wild Foods offer a powerful source of nutrition that is not only free, but actually benefits the ecosystem while strengthening your awareness of your relationship to it. These foods are invariably more nutritious and therapeutic than their domesticated relatives. Bringing them back into our lives in any amount is one of the best investments we can make in our longevity, in our strength, in our Vibrancy and Vitality.
When we use local Wild Foods we re receiving the medicines and macro-nutrient (fat, carbohydrate, protein) profiles and ratios that are particular to that species in our own climate. Each meal is representative of the conditions of that place and to eat it places us in the interconnected web of life-forms of that ecosystem.
It is a critical time for us to remember that we are biotic too, and we are a part of a Living Organism Earth, not separate from it….
Foraging Wild Food teaches us this in a way that is experiential and far more life enhancing than merely learning about it intellectually.
It is why I share videos like these.
Thanks for making some time to read this.
Gratitude!
~Daniel
This Guy Really Eats Wild Food!
Arthur Haines is not your average botanist!
I first met him 2 years ago at the Maine Primitive Skills Gathering… He was dressed in buckskins and was winnowing wild rice in a pit he had dug in the ground… I knew at that moment I had found someone I wanted to study with!
Arthur is truly a renaissance man. He is a scientist, an author, a martial artist, a primitive skills master (He and his partner Nicole start all the fires for their wood-stove with a handrill!), and by far the greatest teacher that I have found for wild food foraging in my neck of the woods!
Every Year he leads seasonal foraging classes near his home in Maine. I took a 3 day course with him last summer and learned more in a few days than I had in years of study. When it comes to plants, it is clear that Arthur has found his calling!
What’s more is that he truly understands how to use the plants around him. Whether for food, fuel, fiber, or building material, his skill set never ceases to amaze me! What I appreciate most about his teaching style is the way he so effortlessly blends his modern western science background with his deep knowledge of the indigenous uses of the species around him.
It is an honor to present this video series to you!
These of course, are just the first of vids of the series so stay tuned to see the rest! And as always, leave some comments if you find this as inspiring as I do!Thanks Arthur, and thanks to all of you who take the time! ~Daniel
Interview with Stephen Harrod Buhner ~ Part 2
Here it is! Part Two of the Stephen Harrod Buhner interview series!
The more I watch these videos, the more inspired and excited I become. Stephen gives voice to that part of us that seeks the “Wildness of the World”.
In Part 3 he discusses why medicine made by hand is superior to those you purchase (here is a hint.. “relationship”), as well as naming some of his favorite “plauge herbs”!
In Part 4 he addresses Plant Prohibitions and Psychoactive Herbs! Believe me, you want to hear his comments!
By the end of these videos I think you will agree, Stephen is one of the leading minds (and Hearts) in his field today.
~Daniel Vitalis
One of our greatest fears is to eat the wildness of the world.
“Our mothers intuitively understood something essential: the green is poisonous to civilization. If we eat the wild, it begins to work inside us, altering us, changing us. Soon, if we eat too much, we will no longer fit the suit that has been made for us. Our hair will begin to grow long and ragged. Our gait and how we hold our body will change. A wild light begins to gleam in our eyes. Our words start to sound strange, nonlinear, emotional. Unpractical. Poetic.” ~Stephen Harrod Buhner
“Once we have tasted this wildness, we begin to hunger for a food long denied us, and the more we eat of it the more we will awaken. It is no wonder that we are taught to close off our senses to Nature. Through these channels, the green paws of Nature enter into us, climb over us, search within us, find all our hiding places, burst us open, and blind the intellectual eye with hanging tendrils of green.
The terror is an illusion, of course. For most of our million years on this planet human beings have daily eaten the wild. It’s just that the linear mind knows what will happen if you eat it now.” ~ Stephen Harrod Buhner
An Interview with Stephen Harrod Buhner
This Interview could Change the way you Think, Feel, and Perceive the Natural World!
His books have been some of the most influential of any I have read. In Fact, they have fundamentally changed the way that I experience Herbal Medicine! More than that, they set me on a path of using my heart as an organ of perception and cognition!
More than just a profound Herbalist, Stephen is something more like a Bardic Naturalist. His speech is so eloquent that one cannot help but to be inspired (not to mention have their synapses re-networked)!
Stephen’s knowledge base is humbling, and together we access a variety of subjects throughout these four videos…. We range from Heart Based Cognition, Direct Perception and Communication with Plants, Herbal Medicine for Plague and FLu, and even more taboo subjects like the role of Psychoactive Plants in the Eco-System!
Ultimately he describes the role of the Plant Shaman of the Future…. by the way… That means YOU!
Stephen is Reverently Irreverent in his approach to “Re-Wilding” and shares powerful insights about how we have been changed by domestication. Even more powerful are his strategies to reclaiming ourselves!
You’ve gotta see this interview!!!
I was so privileged to attend what Stephen described as his last workshop for the next few years! If you have ever had a chance to study with him in person, Take Heart! This interview is Stephen speaking from the culmination of all his teachings, writings, travel and professional practice up until now.
This interview was recorded at the end of a five-day immersive retreat hosted by Richard at Nelson’s Mountain Waters Retreat Center. What an amazing place, and what amazing people. The Land, Facilities, Garden and Fresh, Wild, Living Spring Water created the most perfect setting! Thanks Richard!
An Excerpt from one of my favorite books Authored by Stephen,
The Secret Teaching of Plants…
We in the West have been immersed in a particular mode of cognition the past hundred years, a mode defined by its linearity, it tendency to reductionism, and an insistence on the mechanical nature of Nature. This mode of cognition, the verbal/intellectual/ analytical (VIA), is now the dominant one in Western culture.
There is, however, another mode of cognition, one our species has used during the majority of its time on this planet–the holistic/ intuitive/ depth (HID) mode of cognition. Its expression can be seen in howancient and indigenous peoples gathered their knowledge about the world in which they lived and how they gathered knowledge of the uses of plants as medicines.
All ancient and indigenous peoples said that they learned the uses of plants as medicines from the plants themselves. For, they insisted, the plants can speak to human beings if only human beings will listen and respond to them in the proper state of mind. Gathering of knowledge directly from the wildness of the world is called biognosis–meaning “knowledge from life”–and, because it is inherent in our very physical bodies, it is something that everyone has the capacity to develop. It is something, in fact, that all of us use (at least minimally) without awareness in our day-to-day lives. It is a way of being that is concerned with our interconnection to the web of life that surrounds us, with wholeness rather than parts, with the very human journey in which we are all engaged.
~Stephen Harrod Buhner
Parts 3 and 4 of this video series are coming soon! Check back in a couple of days for those and in the meantime post your comments and questions and I’ll be sure to get back with you!
~Daniel
