How to get food in the forest. How to get food in the rainforest? Essential substances in pasture

Wild edible plants. Dish recipes

Finding food is the original form of travel. Even if the search area is only a couple of blocks of urban or suburban parkland, such an activity can appear as something primitive, something pre-linguistic, which lies in time immemorial early humanity.
I first started studying edible plants when I was seven or eight years old. For thirty years of his research, he came to a startling conclusion:
* no matter how harsh the conditions may seem, you can always find something to chew on, what you can get hold of if you know what and where to look.
* Finding wild food can give you the ability to see, feel, hear, and understand terrain details like directions and slopes that you didn't notice before.
My main criteria for selecting the following wild plants was their availability and growth right in urban and suburban areas. When collecting food, do not forget to correctly identify the plants, for which use special guides and reference books, and do not eat more than you need. But basically, if you are not lost, then when looking for wild edible plants, just enjoy the walk.
1. Reeds 2. Acorns 3. Plantain 4. Coniferous 5. Sumac 6. Juniper berries 7. Wild mint 8. Wild onion 9. Fennel 10. Clover 11. Arrowhead 12. Snotlout 13. Victorious onion, wild garlic 14. Chicory 15. Sorrel 16. Susak 17. Sow thistle 18. Oxalis 19. Dandelion 20. Burdock (burdock) 21. Potentilla goose 22. Ivan tea (fireweed) 23. Cattail 24. Quinoa 25. Calamus 26. Cucumber grass (comfrey) 27. Nettle dioecious

1. Reed
Master once told me that if you find yourself in a survival situation and find reeds, you will never go hungry. It has a few edible parts that I've never tried but heard are delicious, like pollen that can be used as a flour substitute. And I tried cattail root, which can be cooked like potatoes. And it's really delicious.
2. Acorns
Acorns are edible and highly nutritious, however they need to be pre-treated (leached) before cooking to remove the tannic acid that makes acorns bitter. For leaching, you need to boil them for 15 minutes, thus softening the shell. After cooling, cut them in half and scoop out the pulp. Collect this pulp in a saucepan, fill with water, salt and cook again for 10 minutes. Drain and boil again, repeating the process 1-2 times. As a result, you will be left with the sweet pulp of an acorn. Salt to taste.

13-04-2010, 23:12

We all think that nothing can happen to us. That our train will never derail, the car will not stop in the middle of the road with a broken tire, and the mushroom picking will end successfully and the path will lead straight to the house. Usually, in 99.9% of cases, this is exactly what happens. However, every thousandth is still unlucky. If you think about it all the time, it’s easier to sit at home and not stick your nose out the door, saying goodbye to hiking and traveling.

Although in order to safely get out of such a mess, in fact, you need quite a bit: take a map of the area, a spare tire and a repair kit with you when you go on a trip, matches and a knife when you go mushrooming. The rules for not getting lost are very simple. Surviving lost is also easy - so much so that even girls from high school, lagging behind the group, are able to spend several days in the forest and safely wait until they are found by rescuers.
You could already read about how to build a hut and get the simplest dishes in previous articles. But it is much more important what all pilots and astronauts are taught and what all tourists should know, anyway, whether they prefer sightseeing or individual hiking trips - this is the answer to the question of how to find food in the forest.

Our ancestors looked with surprise at people who could not survive in the forest - a place that fed people from time immemorial. But today the vast majority of tourists who find themselves in extreme conditions, capable of dying of hunger, passing by a richly laid table of forest dishes. In fact, the most nutritious and simple protein food is right under every traveler's feet. And to capture her, you don’t need a gun or a knife at all. A shovel or, at worst, a digging stick is enough. Because that protein-rich food is earthworms.

In order to survive, you have to eat them. It is enough to dig up guest worms and place them for several hours in running water so that digested earth comes out of them. It is almost impossible to look at such food, but it is quite real. They even have a taste - far from refined, but still. It is even better to boil the rinsed and soaked worms - in this form it is much more pleasant to eat them.

The next forest-meat dish is a frequent guest in restaurants, especially French ones. Of course, our frogs are far from being as large as those served in France, but they can be eaten, because they taste almost like chicken, and are quite common in the forest. And it's easy to catch them. The main thing is to remove the skin and put the paws on the sticks to fry. You can eat raw, but a person is more accustomed to hot and cooked food.

Mice are harder to get, but still possible. Observations on polar wolves and subsequent experiments on humans, described by Farley Mowat, showed that a person who eats field mice whole, along with the insides, receives a complete set of substances necessary for life and may not even suffer from beriberi.

With the meat menu sorted out. The second essential food for humans is bread. Of course, a tourist can come across an abandoned, but sown field or pick up a piece of land thrown by a magpie, but in fact, bread in the forest can be obtained much easier. Especially if you meet a river or lake.

Large white lotus-like flowers, rounded leaves - this is what a water lily or white lily looks like. Now there are not so many of them left on Russian reservoirs, but when it comes to human life, you don’t have to choose. Water lily rhizome is 49% starch, 8% protein, and about 20% sugar. Of course, before you gnaw it, you will have to dry it, grind it into flour and soak it in running water to remove tannins. But then, after drying, this flour can be used for baking bread or dough strips wound on sticks over a fire, or simply to whiten her soup-chatter for satiety.

By the way, similar flour can be made from acorns and even dandelion roots, an eternal weed and a thunderstorm of summer cottages. True, they will also have to be dried first, then soaked twice, and only then, dried again, ground into flour or cereal to create porridge, but when you are hungry, you don’t have to be particularly picky.

Suitable for flour and the rhizome of cattail - the very one from which the children make spears, calling it reeds. Moreover, its root can no longer be soaked, just cut into pieces, dry, grind and bake-cook as much as you want. And if you fry pieces of roots, you can also make a coffee drink from them. Not Arabica, of course, but invigorating on a hike, but what more could you want from reeds? You can also pick up young shoots, boil them and serve them to frog legs - the taste of the shoots resembles asparagus. Far away, of course. But the menu for the forest "French" restaurant is almost ready.

Icelandic lichen, which is found in central Russia in pine forests, is also edible. And not just for deer. It contains 44% soluble starch lechenin and about 3% sugar. In order for a person to eat it, it is necessary to deprive the lichen of bitter substances. Therefore, Icelandic moss is soaked with soda or potash for a day. For those who are not accustomed to carrying soda on an industrial scale, it can be advised to pour Icelandic moss with ash infusion. Approximately 2 tablespoons of ash per liter of water, add another two liters of water and you can soak one hundred grams of Icelandic moss. After a day, the moss must be washed and soaked for another day in plain water. And then either dry, grind and add to other flour, or boil it into jelly and pour aspic from the mined meat or jelly from wild berries. In addition, cunning Swedes distill alcohol from Icelandic lichen. So the forest is not only ready to feed and shelter any lost tourist, but also to give a skillful opportunity to have fun and warm up from the inside.

Of the other green edible plants that are commonly overlooked, burdock is worth mentioning. Its roots are best collected in early spring or late autumn, but in summer they are quite capable of feeding a tourist. They can be eaten raw, boiled and even better baked. Completely replaces potatoes, carrots or celery. And if you boil peeled and chopped burdock roots with sorrel or sorrel, you can get an excellent sweet and sour jam.

The familiar and seemingly useless woodlouse plant can also be eaten - in salads, soups or even mashed potatoes. They do the same with sour, snytka and "hare cabbage". And the youth will completely replace Brussels sprouts in forest green soups or baked as a side dish.

The forest table is not as familiar as our ordinary one, but much richer than ordinary tourists imagine. When you have canned food and cereals with you, you can neglect it, but you still need to know about it. And only then, in an extreme situation, decide whether it is worth dying of hunger next to such delicious dishes.

One of my favorite methods of finding food while honing my survival skills is what I call "eating on the go". This one is simple but effective method requires a little extra energy input on the part of the survivor, in exchange for a generous and nutritious reward.

BASIC REQUIREMENTS FOR APPLICATION OF THE FOOD ON THE GO METHOD :

• You are heading from point A to point B, perhaps looking for help.
• The food you are looking for should be right in your path and take a minimum of time and effort to collect.
• You don't veer off course for the sake of pursuit, if suddenly the prey escaped from your direction. Thus, we exclude the waste of precious energy and time.
• Let go of all your prejudices about food. Remember, insects and other reptiles are eaten every day by many cultures around the world. Don't compromise your survival out of ignorance.

The secret to successful on-the-go survival is to keep your sights on easily accessible food, no matter how small or what kind of food (animals, insects or plants). Stick to your itinerary and stop momentarily to collect food whenever possible. This means that you will spend almost no energy on finding food while traveling. And by taking the necessary short breaks, you will be provided with food and will be able to replenish your body with energy.

SURVIVAL PRACTICE

On a recent hike, I decided to practice foraging while moving. During the few kilometers that I walked through the forest to my destination, I constantly scanned the immediate surroundings on my way in search of food (applying only a minimum of effort) to cook in a pot.

EDIBLE CLOVER

Wood sorrel bedding is the first edible food that I have come across. This clover grows in cool, damp places. This is a great salad lemon flavor. From clover it turns out tasty soup or cabbage soup. These foods are low in calories, but contain essential vitamins and nutrients that keep the body strong and healthy.

In a short time, I collected about a quarter liter of wood sorrel and continued on my way. Such pauses while foraging were welcome breaks, after which I continued to move with a burst of fresh energy. This is an essential element of survival: short breaks give you the rest you need over long distances.

SLUGS ARE GOOD SURVIVAL FOOD

The next dish on the menu was an ordinary slug that moved on a damp stone. It takes very little effort to simply lean down and pick it up; it barely slows down. Along the route I noticed ten or twelve of these creatures, all of them went to my food bins.

I put everything edible that can run, fly and crawl in a container lightly filled with water. This prevents escape when I open the lid to add someone else.

EAT INSECTS THAT EAT YOU!

Continuing the movement, I heard an annoying buzzing above my head. Two horseflies (chrysalis, deer fly) tried to feast on me, but I caught them as soon as they sat on my hand. Like most insects, flies are an excellent source of fat and protein. Despite the size of a large housefly, I placed them in a container with slugs. In a survival situation, do not skip any food source. All this together will help you get through the next day.

If your life is at stake, you must put aside any preconceptions about what you can and cannot eat. People around the world consume insects as a natural food. So what's stopping you? I think like this: if you can eat a clam (a worm in its shell that feeds sewage), so you can eat anything.

GRASSHOPPERS ARE GREAT SURVIVAL FOOD

Finally, I came to a small open area of ​​the forest. Making their way through the tall grass, dozens of large grasshoppers jumped into different sides from me. Some of these grasshoppers were almost the size of my little finger. They were fairly easy to catch due to the cool weather which made them a little lethargic.

Grasshoppers are a readily available source of protein and fat. I took a five minute break and caught seven or eight grasshoppers.

STARCH

Going deeper into the forest, I began to come across an Indian cucumber more and more often. The Indian cucumber is easily recognizable by its starchy root, which is a cross between a cucumber and a potato. This nutritious fruit is easily obtained with a little digging. Extracting the root takes a few seconds if you use a pointed tool (such as an ax).

Pausing here and there, I picked up about a dozen Indian cucumber roots. This will provide me with a handful of excellent survival food with a high starch content and low waste of time and energy for their preparation.

ANTS

The nest of black ants towered above the surface of the earth. It was obvious that a bear had recently been here and the ants were feverishly restoring their home. Following the bear, I stuck the end of the ax into the nest to collect angry ants and pupae in a jug of water. Be aware that some species of ants have the ability to sting and bite and can be extremely dangerous in large numbers. Despite this, all types of ants are edible.

PINE NEEDLES

Pine needles are high in vitamin C and other nutrients. Vitamin C is very important for survival. it is necessary in the process of recovery of the body and healing of wounds. In a real survival situation, you can also peel off the edible inner bark of a pine tree. This will kill the tree, so don't resort to this method unless absolutely necessary. If you boil such a bark, then it will become a good food for survival.

COOKING FOOD

Toward the end of the journey, I came across a small stream. Here you can replenish water supplies and use it for cooking. Of course, any untested source of water must be free of harmful microorganisms, no matter how pure it looks.

Boiling is my favorite method of purifying drinking water. This is the most effective way to neutralize pathogens.

Here's what's in my pot:

• 1/4 liter wood sorrel petals
• 11 slugs
• 2 horseflies
• 8 large grasshoppers
• 50 medium black ants and ant pupae
• handful of Indian cucumber roots
• handful of pine needles

Wood sorrel cooked quickly and became similar to spinach, only much tastier. Its lemon flavor provided great flavor! A pot full of proteins, fats, carbohydrates and vitamins provided me with quite tasty and nutritious food in just a few hours of walking along the set route. And for this almost no additional energy and time was expended.

Bon appetit!

Networks.

Stretch a fine mesh net between trees where birds nest. If there is no net, thin branches criss-crossed between the trees in the path of the birds will help knock them to the ground, where you will break their necks.

Birdlime.

Any grain plant containing starch is boiled in water until a sticky mass is formed. The resulting glue is applied to tree branches and other places used by birds as a perch. Sitting on places smeared with glue, birds stick to them and cannot fly away.

Hanging snares.

A row of snares are suspended above the river just above the water level. Such a trap works best in thickets of reeds or reeds.

Lure Hooks.

Bait fishhooks with pieces of fruit or other food and scatter them on the level waters. The hook gets stuck in the bird's throat.

Sticks with loops.

Trap in the form of number 4.

This device can be used in combination with a pyramid-like cage (for example, made of interconnected wooden rods) mounted above the bait.

When making a cage for catching small birds, the rods are put in place, two sticks of the same length are placed on top of them and tied to the underlying rods so that the rest do not move apart. More large birds and animals have more strength, therefore, in a cage intended for them, each rod must be tied separately. The stronger the cage, the better.

Sliding loop.

For catching sleeping birds, a long pole with a sliding loop tied to it is used. A clear moonlit night is best time for hunting. Creeping up to the roosting place of the birds, you throw a noose around one of them, and the noose is tightened when you drag the bird towards you.

Catching waterfowl.

Mask your head and shoulders with reed stalks or other vegetation and enter the water. Carefully approach the nesting place of birds, not forgetting that birds can put up desperate resistance.

If there are large pumpkins nearby, then hollow out one of them, and cut holes in it through which you can breathe and look. Put the pumpkin prepared in this way on your head. To prepare the birds, several other gourds should be thrown into the water. Then the hunter enters the water and, floating with the current among the birds, grabs them from below and under the water twists their necks.

Catching seagulls.

Seagulls can be caught by tossing a stone wrapped in food into the air. A seagull swallows the bait along with the stone in flight, and a sharp change in the weight of the bird leads to its fall. It is quite obvious that this technique should be used above the ground, and not above the water. Be ready to kill the bird as soon as it hits the ground.

Catching small animals.

A well trap is used to catch small animals. The depth of the well and its diameter are determined depending on which animal needs to be caught.

The animal, smelling the bait, climbs into the well and can no longer get out of it. It remains only to stun him, pull him out and kill him.

Trapping hole.

Find or dig a hole 90 cm deep in the habitat of birds foraging on the ground. The width of the hole depends on the type of bird. Scatter grain or other bait around the hole, and add more food to the bottom.

Having pecked the bait first around the pit, the bird will sink to the bottom for food. This is the right moment for a swift throw: there is not enough room for a frightened bird to fully spread its wings and take off from the bottom of the pit.

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Left alone with wildlife without food, it will be very difficult for an unadapted person to survive. And in such cases it is better to be able to find and use as food what nature gives. Yes, the products will have a completely unusual look for a city dweller, and, moreover, they will still have to be mined. But it's still better than starving to death. In any area, probably, except for glaciers, knowledgeable person will be able to provide himself with breakfast, lunch and dinner thanks to the gifts that nature gives him.

Food in the forest

In the forest, food in the form of young tree bark located on the trunk can become a source of proteins and fats for you. Such a bark will be more nutritious in the spring, when the trees are filled with sap. It is also suitable for use in the summer and autumn season. This bark is also called sapwood, which can be mined as follows: on a tree trunk, you need to make a couple of deep horizontal cuts with a knife or ax. Then, prying with any sharp object, you need to remove the upper bark.

Sapwood can be eaten in fresh or boil in boiling water, then the bark swells and takes the form of porridge, which should be used in your diet. Undoubtedly, such food will have a specific taste and smell. But in this case there should be no squeamishness and the main task- do not die of exhaustion.

As food, you can take the secondary bark of such trees as: birch, aspen, maple, spruce, willow, poplar, pine. It is this bark that will be most useful. The young sprouts and buds of all these trees can also be food for you. And you can also use birch sap and tree sap, thickened on their trunks, it is also called "resin". In pine, its young shoots and flower buds, as well as cones, are edible. From the needles you can make a vitamin drink.

And many northern peoples use edible parts of willow as food - young sprouts and leaves, and even prepare them for the winter. Seal skin sacks are stuffed with leaves and shoots that sour throughout the summer. Closer to the onset of frost, the mass froze, after which it was cut into pieces and eaten instead of bread. This ensured the intake of natural vitamins and useful substances.

Cattails, reeds and reeds are also suitable as food. Nuts and berries are the most valuable in terms of their taste.

A lot of tasty and nutritious berries, mushrooms, roots, herbs generously gives us nature. The most important thing is to be able to find and recognize them, as well as to know the characteristics of the local flora where you are going to travel. It is also very important to know edible and poisonous plants, as they say, "in the face." And poisonous plants are best remembered and sometimes more important to be able to find them than edible ingredients. By doing so, you will reduce the risk of tasting something poisonous and save your health and your life.

Hunger. Only our ignorance makes us think that a person cannot live a day without food. In fact, human resources are limitless. Fasting, as a unique innate ability of each person, proves this once again.
Many people, having found themselves in an emergency situation, unexpectedly discovered this amazing ability of our body.

Of course, the course of fasting in emergency situations for an unprepared person and one who consciously applies fasting are very different. But even in such situations, with their experience, people proved that a person still contains many secrets and possibilities, and we are only on the verge of realizing, understanding and putting into practice everything that is hidden that is inherent in each of us from birth. . Don't be afraid of hunger. If you don't move much, you can easily go twenty days without food. If you just walk, you can endure six days. Some travel aces arrange “hungry trips” so as not to carry extra cargo with them and not waste time fussing with dishes and food. Hygiene fasting is. Complete fasting is more easily tolerated than partial fasting. The feeling of hunger is present only for the first three days. We must suppress it with abundant consumption warm water. Then the body adjusts to the situation. After about 20 days of fasting, the feeling of hunger reappears. This is already a signal that dystrophy begins. Don't jump on food right away. The first doses must be scanty, otherwise you will die. In 6 hungry days you are able to overcome 200 kilometers. There are few places on Earth where this is not enough to go to housing. You need to accustom yourself to a hunger strike in advance by “ unloading days" once a week.
However, once in an emergency, try to do without such a shocking body action - like starvation. Getting food in the forest is quite simple, below are a few ways to get food while surviving.

Obtaining plant foods.

Many plants are edible, which, as a rule, we do not eat.

As for mushrooms, this is a heavy and risky food for the body. Unless necessary, it is better not to eat them at all. Mushrooms that have not undergone heat treatment are especially unfavorable for the intestines and dangerous. Old, overripe mushrooms are more unhealthy. It is harmful to eat a lot of sorrel: oxalic acid converts blood calcium into an insoluble compound.

You can eat the fruits of oak and mountain ash, fallen acorns, they should be soaked for several hours in water, changing the water several times, then roasted. They also eat:
1. young leaves (plantain; blackcurrant; wild rose; small-leaved linden; large burdock; dandelion; meadow clover; common mother-and-stepmother; dissected cow parsnip; spring primrose; field yaruka; rhubarb);
2. young shoots (blackberry; chicory; fireweed; caraway sorrel; white sage);
3. roots that can be eaten raw (willow-tea, lake reed, calamus, medicinal burnet, six-petaled meadowsweet, large burdock, creeping couch grass, lungwort);
4. Roots used in the form of flour (dandelion, lake reed, snake mountaineer, viviparous mountaineer, tuberous gooseberry, marsh marigold, sea tuber, yellow egg pod, white water lily, goose cinquefoil, creeping wheatgrass, broad-leaved cattail, susak umbrella, medicinal burnet) .

Edible leaves are best stored as follows: first dry, ferment like cabbage (for example, young dandelion leaves), then make a sour-salty puree (add vinegar and salt) and store in the cold. Coffee can be prepared from roasted and ground burdock roots (first year of life), dandelion, chicory.

Recipe for eating flour from edible roots: cut, dry, grind, make dough, bake. Root flour can be added to cereal flour. You can ferment flour: add ordinary bread or crackers, soak and put in warm place until bubbles and a sour smell appear. Water lily flour should be soaked for several hours, changing the water. A good porridge is cooked from the ground rhizome of the lake reed.

Herbal tea is a source of vitamins and other beneficial substances. To make tea, you can use:
1. flowers, leaves, fruits: wild rose, hawthorn.
2. flowers and leaves: St. John's wort, strawberries, raspberries; cuff; meadowsweet; caraway; white lamb;
3. leaves: nettle, plantain, currant; fireweed, coltsfoot, lungwort, primrose;
4. fruits: cranberries, mountain ash, black elderberry;

Edible plants may have similar non-edible relatives. If the dandelion is familiar to everyone, then the "field yarutka" cannot be recognized without a thick reference book. And what is the difference between "large burdock" and "small burdock"? To do this, the best way out is to make a herbarium of edible plants in a calm time - for a rainy day. Who knows, maybe someday you will have to eat this herbarium.

Obtaining animal food.

The following animals are edible, although they are not usually eaten:
1. mollusks, snails and similar crawling fry.;
2. arthropods: crayfish, crabs, beetle larvae.;
3. amphibians: frogs, toads (but remember - their mucus can be poisonous);
4. reptiles: snakes, turtles, lizards.

Suitable for food: larvae of flies, bark beetles and wood borers, locusts, grasshoppers, cicadas, termites, swimming beetles, cockchafers, scorpions, etc. It is convenient to catch some flying insects (locust, butterflies, etc.) at night on a vertically fixed and illuminated lantern a large piece of white cloth.

Insects can be eaten fried. The chitinous shell of insects is inedible. A sign of a poisonous insect, amphibian, mollusk is usually a bright color. If an animal is eaten by mammals and birds, then it is most likely not poisonous.

Of course, for a person accustomed to European cuisine, eating bugs and fly larvae can cause a gag reflex, however, hunger is not an aunt, in conditions when there is a struggle for the survival of the body, one must eat everything that the body can process. For example, snake meat is even tasty, and almost everyone knows that the French consider the hind legs of frogs a delicacy.

Alyona comments:

Well, after such an article, we definitely won’t die of hunger in the forest! An interesting fact about the "hungry campaigns". Just perfect for people who want to lose weight overweight with health benefits) The main thing is that there is water.

I read this article and plunge into the past. I went through this, survived for a week in the forest on grazing. I baked snails in a fire, but even in such a situation, I did not lose interest in diversity and added linden leaves to the fire. Lunch turned out great, baked snails with linden flavor)) A few years later, we went camping with friends and I treated them to this masterpiece, everyone was happy. Take care of yourself and read more informative articles!

Remember that any person has enough energy reserves to go to populated areas. First of all, try to get out to the people! And only if it is not possible to leave the forest, then the following must be known.

Cold, snowy winter forest, it would seem that you can find food there without a gun or a backpack full of stewJBut this is only at first glance. In fact, even in winter forest without weapons and any hunting skills, you can find food and survive. Although this is not very easy, it is possible. Remember, the northern peoples prepare food for themselves all summer long in order to survive in the winter. But if you are already in an extreme situation, it doesn’t matter how and why, and you don’t have stocks, respectively. Food will have to be obtained - here are some tips on how to do it

Mushrooms in the winter forest

Surprisingly, mushrooms grow in the forest in winter. There are not many of them, but they are all delicious, widely available and not difficult to collect. Winter mushrooms grow mainly on tree trunks, as well as on fallen trees and stumps. It is easy to collect them, as the lack of foliage on the trees allows you to see the mushrooms from afar. Such types of mushrooms as oyster mushroom, winter honey agaric and false honey agaric can be collected throughout the winter. In the winter forest grow not only edible mushrooms, but also medicinal, for example, chaga, the collection time of which falls just at this time. Chaga contains substances that together determine its unique therapeutic properties. The main active principle of chaga is a chromogenic polyphenol carbon complex, which has the highest biological activity and is a powerful biogenic stimulant. This complex is unique, and it has not been found in any other tinder fungus. At the beginning of winter, autumn mushrooms can be found in the forest - rows, autumn mushrooms, tinder fungi. The most common in the winter forest are late oyster mushrooms, which outwardly do not differ from those grown in greenhouses. Oyster mushrooms are similar in shape to shells, which is why they are called shell or oyster mushrooms. The color of the cap of these mushrooms can be light gray, bluish, brown or yellowish. Oyster mushrooms are sometimes confused with tinder fungus, which, unlike oyster mushrooms, does not have a leg, and the flesh is tough, unsuitable for eating. Winter honey agaric of bright yellow-orange color, under the cap of which there are light rare plates. The long stiff leg is covered with a light fluff, it darkens downwards. From above, the cap of mushrooms is covered with protective mucus. Bright orange winter honey agaric against the background of white and blue snow is very beautiful. They grow in groups, most often on aspen, elm, poplar, willow, as well as on old apple and pear trees. It is known that winter mushroom has an antiviral effect and even stops the growth of cancer cells. Less common is the false serolamella, grows on stumps and dead wood. coniferous trees. It should not be confused with the poisonous sulphur-yellow false-opening, which has a bitter taste and bad smell. The edible false foam has a pleasant mushroom smell.

Berries and pasture in winter

Well, first of all, berries such as rose hips, lemongrass, hawthorn, mountain ash and so on. Such berries hang until the very frost, and sometimes even longer. Under the snow on the bolts you can look for cranberries. If you manage to find oak trees, immediately dig the snow, under it you will surely find acorns that you can soak and then cook. Dead wood of burdock is clearly visible from under the snow. And we know that burdock root can replace potatoes for us. But here you have to tighten up and gouge the frozen ground a little. However, if there is a lot of snow, and you dig it out quickly, it is quite possible that the ground will not be so frozen. The rich layer of leaves acts like a thermos, and most often the ground is soft under the snow in the forest.

Horse sorrel in winter sticks out from under the snow with thick brooms of seeds. It is not difficult to see them from afar, thick cinnamon twigs with a lot of seeds. These seeds can be used as cereals. It tastes a bit like oatmeal "Hercules". The roots of reeds and reeds can be eaten; in winter, finding these plants is quite simple.

Edible tree parts

Not only herbaceous plants are suitable for food, but even trees! No, this does not mean that a little-known sausage tree grows in the depths of the taiga, which, having cut down, can be cut into circles, like an ordinary "Doctor's" sausage. Of course not. It is not the trees themselves that are edible, but their individual components, and even then not at any time of the year. For example, cones, acorns or sapwood are thin, young bark adjacent to the trunk.

Pine can offer five edible parts to the table: unblown flower buds, young shoots, sapwood, cones, and needles as a vitamin drink.

In birches, sapwood and bark

The dwarf polar willow is almost completely edible. This shrub no more than 60 cm high is often found in the tundra. It grows in groups, sometimes completely covering the ground.

In the polar willow, in early spring, the inner parts of young shoots freed from the bark are eaten. You can even eat them raw! In addition, young leaves are edible, which are 7-10 times richer in vitamin C than oranges. Flowering "earrings". Young, peeled roots.

And even freed from the bark, well boiled and ground trunks

Oak is an edible tree. From ancient times, the inhabitants of Europe were saved from hunger by oak acorns. Acorns were collected at the end of September or immediately after the first frost. Raw acorns are not suitable for food due to the abundance of tannins in them.

Therefore, they were peeled, cut into four parts and filled with water, soaking for two days, changing the water three times a day to eliminate the bitter taste. Then again they poured water in the proportion of two parts of water to one part of acorns and brought to a boil.

Boiled acorns were scattered in a thin layer in the open air on a wooden baking sheet for pre-drying, and then dried in an oven or on a stove until the acorns began to crackle like crackers. After that, they were crushed or ground. At the same time, coarsely ground groats were used for porridge, and flour was used for baking cakes.

I will quote a few old recipes food made from trees.

“Next, dried fish caviar is prepared, which is intended mainly for men who go to the forest to hunt wild animals. Having a single pound of this dried caviar with him, Kamchadal is provided with provisions for a whole month, because when he wants to eat, he cuts off the bark of a birch (and they grow everywhere here in abundance), removes the upper soft bark, and its hard part, adjacent closer just to the trunk of a tree, spreads a small amount of fish caviar taken with him, and then eats it like a cracker or like a sandwich, which is all his food.

“The bark (of birch) is in great use, for the inhabitants, scraping the bark from a raw tree, chop it with hatchets, like noodles, finely and eat it with dried caviar with such pleasure that in winter time not to find a Kamchatka prison in which the women would not sit near a damp birch ridge and crumble the declared noodles with their stone or bone hatchets.

“Dried sapwood of larch or spruce, rolled into a tube and dried, not only in Siberia, but also in Russia to Khlynov and Vyatka in the hungry years go by for food."

“The Chukchi prepared one of their favorite dishes from the leaves and young shoots of willow, they stocked up for future use. Willows were stuffed into sacks of seal skins, and this kind of silage was left to sour throughout the summer. late autumn such a sour mass froze and in the following months it was cut into slices and eaten like bread.

I hope these lines have convinced skeptics that trees can be used not only as firewood or building material but also to serve!

The most nutritious and tasty sapwood (sometimes it is incorrectly called bast) in the spring, during the period of sap production and intensive growth of the tree. Although, in principle, it can be used for gastronomic purposes both in summer and autumn. Some sources claim that the northern peoples, during a severe famine, ate winter sapwood as an additive to other foods. Although, probably, at this time of the year it already differs little from the upper crust. But, as they say, hunger is not an aunt, there is no time for gourmet food here.

Moreover, I read historical chronicles, which talked about eating bark in general, although it is generally accepted that the upper bark of trees is not suitable for food due to the too abundant content of tannins. It's hard to figure this out. I guess it all depends on how hungry you are.

Academician Likhachev in an interview said that in besieged Leningrad, people dying of hunger ate sawdust (!), For which they threw them into the water, where the tree, after being for a long time, began to ferment. They ate this fermented, smelly, but protein-giving mushy mass.

When harvesting sapwood, it is best to remove it at the base of the trunk or even from thick roots that have crawled out to the surface of the earth, where it is most nutritious and juicy.

Sapwood extraction methods vary.

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The simplest is to make two deep circular horizontal cuts on the trunk with a knife or an ax and two vertical cuts connecting them. Remove the upper bark by prying it on one side with a knife. If it does not lend itself well, you can use small wooden wedges driven between the trunk and the bark.

In principle, sapwood can be eaten raw - it has a sweetish taste, of course, not without a “wooden” aftertaste. Significantly improves it taste qualities long boil. Sapwood, dipped in boiling water, gradually soaks, swells and turns into a uniform gelatinous mass, which, after cooling slightly, should be eaten.

If this “porridge” is dried on stones heated on a fire, or on another improvised frying pan, then the resulting flour can be used for baking bread cakes.

The most nutritious is the secondary bark of birch, willow, maple, pine, aspen, larch, spruce, poplar. By the way, all of these trees, except for larch, have edible buds and young shoots raw, but better boiled.

Nutritious streaks of evaporated and thickened juice on the trunks, reminiscent of chewing gum.

Game

Of course, it is best to eat meat, fried or boiled, in the cold, but if you do not have weapons, it will be very difficult to get them. Although it’s possible and possible to grab a hazel grouse if you’re lucky. To do this, you first need to find a place to spend the night. Keep an eye on the birds if they suddenly flutter out from under your feet, but do not chase them very actively, otherwise they will run away. These birds feed at dawn and dusk, after which they burrow into the snow. Take the nearest hole and wait until dark. Stepping almost silently, and lighting your way with a torch, you need to approach the hole and fall on it with your whole body, while spreading the floors of your clothes. Perhaps you will be lucky.

If you have a weapon, then try to hunt, remember, the wind must blow in your face all the time, otherwise the beast will smell you before you see it!!! Footprints, learn to read them. With a certain skill and windy weather, you can sneak up on the hare's bed. Attention: A good-natured-looking bunny, with a kick of its hind leg, calmly rips open a winter jacket and your stomach under it. Even a small, wounded animal is dangerous (There is a known case when a stunned hare lying in a shoulder bag came to his senses and tore his back and a jacket with a sweater into meat). Kill for sure. Place traps and trap loops on animal paths. You can make a trap like an ice bucket in the snow, which is covered on top with a piece of ice with a hole, inside the bait. There is also a vertical pipe ice trap, you can catch a bird there if you are lucky. The pipe is large enough for a bird or animal to easily climb into it for bait, but it will be difficult to get out (slips). Do not disdain mice, they are easier to get. These traps can be made with bare hands. Putting a bucket or a tin can on the snow hot water or coals, and it will gradually sink, and the edges and bottom of the formed pit will be covered with ice. A black object thrown on the snow on a sunny day, a cooled coal, will also begin to sink into snow or ice. Look for thawed areas on the rivers, there is something to profit from, if possible, make an ice-hole yourself, the fish is guaranteed to you, since in winter there is a lack of oxygen up to the ice. At night, you can lure fish with the light of a torch or flashlight, do not forget to make a spear before that.You can also look for winter stocks forest dwellers, squirrels and birds on bushes and trees. Always leave a supply of food obtained, preferably for 3-4 days. Looking at the number of mined

B. Polevoy "The Tale of a Real Man"

"That day he was lucky again. In the fragrant juniper bush, with whose gray, matte berries he cut off with his lips, he saw some strange lump of dead leaf. He touched his hand - the lump was heavy and not crumbled. Then he began to pick off the leaves and pricked on the protruding needles through them. He guessed: a hedgehog. Big old hedgehog climbing in a thicket of a bush for the winter, for warmth I rolled over the fallen autumn leaves. Crazy joy took possession of Alexei. ... ... And then a piece of meat itself fell into his hands. Not a moment's hesitation over the fact that hedgehogs are believed to be filthy animals, he quickly plucked the scales of foliage from the animal. the hedgehog did not wake up, did not unfold and looked like a funny, huge bean bristling with needles. With a dagger blow Alexei killed the hedgehog, unrolled it, clumsily tore off the yellow skin on abdomen and spiny shell, cut it into pieces and with pleasure began to tear teeth still warm, bluish, sinewy meat, tightly adherent to the bones. Hedgehog was eaten immediately, without a trace. Alexei gnawed and swallowed all the small bones and only after that he felt a nasty smell of dog in his mouth. But what this smell means in comparison with a full stomach, from which all over satiety, warmth and drowsiness overflowed the body!

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Water

Speaking of water. It is better to use melted ice. In no case should you eat snow, as this can lead to dehydration. Strange but true. Ice in fragments is also not necessary to eat, you can injure your lips, tongue or esophagus, and even get excessive hypothermia of the body. Melting ice on water is much more efficient than snow.

Cooling degree and fire

The degree of cooling should be checked by trying to connect the little finger of the hand with the index finger. If it doesn't work out - 20 squats and start making fire. Remember: when physical activity When setting up a camp or chopping firewood, you should never allow your clothes to become damp with sweat. It is always advisable to warm up well at night. There is an exotic way of making fire in case there are no matches, etc. on a sunny day with ice. You need a transparent piece of ice, which you will give the shape of a lens with a knife or the heat of your hands. Of course, this is not quite glass, but with a certain patience, you can kindle a fire with it. Dilute the node, prepare firewood for the whole night, and more. when making a bed, never make yourself a couch on the ground. better than a meter of snow. Frozen ground drains strength very, very quickly.

Based on materialsInternet and books Andrey Ilyin"School of survival. How to avoid starvation"

Once in nature, apart from the usual household goods, there is a risk of being completely helpless. Inability to kindle a fire, put up a tent and distinguish poisonous mushroom from russula - these are the qualities that characterize the modern tourist. It is especially hard for unadapted townspeople at the moment when they are overtaken by hunger. This is where many people remember that the first season of the show “Survive at all costs” remained unwatched.

In this material, we will talk about several ways to cook food in the field. We decided not to stop at detailed recipes, because usually in conditions of a tourist shortage, everything that is at hand is used. And let's focus on the technique and features of the cooking process.

WHAT TO BRING WITH YOU

Army bowler hat, appliances, S-hook, foil, wire, shovel, axe, knife

BONFIRE

A fire for cooking, like any other, is best kindled at the bottom of a ravine or on the leeward side of a forest. The river bank is also suitable, plus - you don’t have to run far for water. It is best to dig a small hole 20–30 centimeters deep in the ground in advance so that it is not so easy for the wind to interfere with the cooking process and it is easier to bake in ashes and coals.

In general, there are many types of bonfires, depending on the design, fuel and purposes it serves. We will look at four that are ideal for cooking.

Bonfires in the form of a star and a well burn out for a long time (in the case of a star fire, it is enough to periodically shift the burned-out firewood to the center) and give very good and hot coals. On such a fire, it is ideal to cook camping soups, roast pieces of meat and carcasses of a dead bird on a spit.

To cook soup, an army bowler hat is usually hung on a crossbar or a makeshift tripod over a fire. Here it will not be superfluous to have a hook for hanging a bowler hat with you - you can buy one at any tourist store or make it yourself from hard wire. You can also set the dishes on a large and flat stone next to the fire in such a way that the flame touches it.

For your information

Mushrooms found in the forest, simple camping cakes, small pieces of meat can also be fried on a sapper shovel, smearing it with bacon or a small amount of fat. This technique is unlikely to reveal additional taste properties of food, but it will not leave you without hot food if the frying utensils accidentally fell overboard the boat or were left at home due to an oversight.

TAIGA CANDLE

Another incredibly convenient and effective way to cook hot food in nature is a wooden stove or, as it is also called, a taiga candle. To make it, you need to take a thick dry log and cut a low (20-40 centimeters) cylinder out of it. It is better not to choose resinous tree species for these purposes - they will give too many sparks and “shoot” with molten resin.

The log must be carefully split with an ax along the middle and cut down the core to form a small channel with a diameter of 5–7 centimeters. The output should be something like a thick wooden pipe. Now both halves must be tightly fastened to each other, wrapped with wire or nailed, otherwise the candle will quickly burn through the cracks. We fill the stove with paper or birch bark, install it in such a way that air enters it from the lower end. We set it on fire and get a full-fledged comforter made of natural material.

Such a hearth has several advantages over a fire. Firstly, no additional devices are needed in order to fix a frying pan or a pot on it - the surface of the stove is already flat. Secondly, it does not take up much space and does not require constant fire support. At the same time, it is able to burn and give an impressive heat for quite a long time. Thirdly, you can easily hold it in your hand and, if you wish, cook food even on the go, although this is unlikely to occur to anyone. Finally, extinguishing the candle as unnecessary, it can be reused over time.

GROUND FURNACE

First of all, it is necessary to dig a shallow hole in the ground about half a meter deep. Then the bottom of the pit is covered in layers with small stones, a layer of kindling and branches. Having filled the pit to the top with fuel, a dense layer of thicker and longer branches is laid on top, on which stones are again laid out. On top of this heap is placed another layer of stones and firewood. The firewood that serves as a support will burn through and fall down along with the heated stones, from which the food will receive the main heat. When the coals finally burn out and give all their heat to the stones, you can put food wrapped in several layers of foil into the pit - a bird carcass, fish, pieces of meat.

Now the food needs to be provided with the most comfortable conditions for baking - we lay out long poles on top of the pit and cover them with a cloth or wide leaves. We sprinkle the sarcophagus with earth and mark the time. Cooking time, of course, depends on the type of food. An hour will be enough for vegetables, one and a half hours for fish cut into small pieces and chicken, and three to four hours for large game carcasses.

For your information

Wild migratory birds do not need to accumulate a large amount of fat in their bodies, and their meat, unlike domestic geese and chickens, is not so soft and juicy. Therefore, in the field, it would be best to cook a stew or some other soup from game. If it is decided to bake the bird after all, its gutted carcass should be stuffed with something, for example, wild apples, chopped pieces of lard, onions or wild berries.

COOKING IN CLAY

One of the most useful camp cooking skills is the ability to bake game in clay. This method is especially useful in the absence of even basic culinary utensils. To be sure of the final result, first of all, it is necessary to obtain suitable clay that can withstand the fire heat. The simplest test is to throw small balls rolled from it into a fire - if they do not crumble under the influence of temperature, then this clay can be trusted with a bird.

Before cooking, the bird must be gutted, rid of the wings and head, but not plucked and carefully coated with clay with a layer of two centimeters under the feather. After that, the clay "crypt" is sent to a pile of coals, sprinkled with ash on top. The readiness of the dish should be signaled by the cracks that appeared on the surface of the clay. Now the crust is broken and removed along with the feathers stuck to it, releasing the finished meat core.

Of course, the process of preparing this dish is not the easiest and requires some skill and experience - for the first time there is a big risk of turning the fruits of the hunt into a burnt lump. But it’s still worth mastering this method - if only for the rest of your life to show off to your friends that you tried a wild pigeon in clay.

WATER

The water supplies taken with you for a long stay in nature are usually not enough, and five-liter buckets or water coolers are hardly associated with a free tourist life. Sooner or later, you will have to draw water to make soup from the river. One of its unclear gray color will tell you that it would be nice to clean and disinfect such water. A mandatory cleaning item is filtration through gauze and boiling for 15-20 minutes. Experienced tourists take with them, among other things, Pantocid and Aquatabs tablets - one tablet is enough to purify one liter of water. Iodine (two to five drops per liter) and potassium permanganate (one to two grams per liter) are good for purifying water.