Did you go to summer camp as a kid? I didn't, but just last week I learned that it's never too late when I boarded a bus full of strangers and embarked on an adventure complete with campfires, bunk beds, and hands-on workshops. It was a life-changing experience, accompanied by the taste of fragrant mountain conifers. 

Q: As kids in the early 30's, we used to pick seaweed at the North Shore in Massachusetts. Our mother would use it to make tapioca pudding. I have no idea what seaweed it was and no one seems to remember. Has anyone ever done this or know anything about it? I'd love to trace its history!

Sent by Daphne

If you're a foraging newbie, learning about how to gather and prepare wild food can seem daunting. And if you're a seasoned forager, you can always use new inspiration for what to do with the bounty. Here are four new resources for both crowds, including two cookbooks, a memoir, and an audio tour. 

Spring officially arrives this week, and what better time for the release of Amy Stewart's delightful new book, The Drunken Botanist. As you're planning your garden, foraging for wild plants, or simply looking for a good cocktail recipe (and cocktail party conversation topics!), you don't want to miss this entertaining and illuminating guide to "the plants that create the world's great drinks." More

In Preserving Wild Foods, chef Matthew Weingarten and collaborator Raquel Pelzel celebrate wild and seasonal foods of the coastline, pasture, garden, forest, and wetland — and the preservation techniques that can make these treasures available year-round.
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Cloudberries, reindeer lichen, and black grouse aren't the sorts of ingredients everyone has in his or her pantry or local environment, but that shouldn't prevent home cooks and food lovers from being enchanted and inspired by Chef Magnus Nilsson's new cookbook, Fäviken. More

On the train into San Francisco last week, I noticed some cactus growing along the fences with brilliant purple fruits perched on the end of each thorny arm. It wasn't until I saw baskets of this same fruit at the market over the weekend that I realized what I'd seen: prickly pears! Have you ever made anything with this fruit? More

Blue elderberry wine is every bit as good as a grape wine—or so says Hank Shaw, forager extraordinaire. When blue elderberries are picked at perfect ripeness, crushed, soaked, and fermented, he likens the result to some of the "huskier, more brooding" red grape wines like Mourvedre and Petit Verdot. If this idea intrigues you, you're in luck! Mr. Shaw has provided a step-by-step guide to making your own elderberry wine, and since the elderberry season runs from July to early October, now is the perfect time to do it. More

I get really excited when I see berries growing on the side of the road. I inherited this obsession from my mother who, during our vacation each summer in northern Idaho, would go on a walk with a big bag and not allow herself to return until she had picked a thousand huckleberries. We'd make dozens of jars of jam, huckleberry pancakes, and frozen kiddie drinks. I don't remember us ever looking at a recipe. More

Something strange is happening in my back yard. In a summer with droughts that rival the Dust Bowl and a prolonged heat wave harsher than any in recent memory, the apple tree right outside my kitchen door is flourishing like never before. That is to say, it's producing a lot of fruit. More