http://instagram.com/forager_in_italy, https://www.fitoalimurgia.org/

Forager in Italy, Torricella Peligna (2026)

24/03/2026

Tree mallow dolmades (wrappers).
Tree mallow looks like wild hollyhock: really tall, even over 3 metres, large velvety leaves, pink flowers. The leaves can be used as wrappers for dolmades (or gołąbki, or sarmale).

You pick the l largest, healthy looking leaves. Cut away tough stems as close to the leaf as possible. Wash in a basin filled with cold water.

Meanwhile, prepare stuffing of your choice. I went for minced goat meat, split barley grouts and fried onions, seasoned with salt and white pepper. You can use any mince and grains, or mushroom, nuts or just grains for a vegetarian/vegan option.

Blanch the leaves for a few seconds in salty water, drain and spread them out top side up on a tray/worktop. Arrange the stuffing shaped like a tiny sausage on each. Prepare a shallow dish in which they will cook. Sprinkle olive oil, line the bottom with baking paper. Roll up your dolmades: fold the bottom tightly over the stuffing, fold each side in and roll away from you forming a little springroll. Arrange all tightly in the dish.
Now pour some broth over to just cover the wrappers, add some white wine and maybe a few bay leaves, cover with a plate and start cooking on very low heat. After about 2 hours of very slow bubbling, your dolmades are ready!

I served them for our Wild Spring Lunch at IL Monte Farmhouse Abruzzo , with a side of lartichoke hearts, peas and stems of black mustard and wild fennel fronds sauce. You can do your own thing 😊

Happy foraging and enjoy your weeds in the kitchen!

18/03/2026

What great cheese I invented, another of the botanical cheeses series: improved recipe for caprino with raw goats milk and fermented nettles.

The nettles, freshly picked, got packed tightly in a jar, lid closed. Then put on a radiator until they changed colour. Then out on a baking tray and dried, crushed to chili flakes /rough powder texture and stored. A process not so different to making black tea, that let's leaves and flowers develop unusual flavours. Fermented nettle becomes floral and has a slight hint of nori. But both surprisingly pleasant together.

Its a semi-hard cheese, matured for 5 weeks, with just very slight acidity and nutty flavours, a really delicate floral and hay aromas. A keeper for sure. I'll make it again today but with just dried nettles - I'm curious to see the difference in both maturing and final flavour.

So I need a name! Hit me with you ideas that read well in both Italian and English, and has to indicate it's both goat cheese and has nettle, or a herb, in it!
Nettle in Italian is ortica, in Latin urtica. We'll disregard the Polish name this time, "pokrzywa" 😆

Cheese 🧀 Goat cheese 🧀 Abruzzo cheese 🧀 Ser kozi 🧀 Formaggio 🧀 Formaggio di capra 🧀 Fermentation

10/03/2026

Cime di rapa (Brassica rapa L. subsp. campestris (L.) Clapham), also called friarelli, is a cultivated winter vegetable relatively unknown outside of Italy. I really don't understand why.

The plant belongs to the brassica (cabbage) genus, so not surprisingly, tastes a bit of cabbage. But also of sprouting broccoli with a slight hint of bitterness. The bitterness is much less than radicchio, so font be put off by this aspect. It is widely used in cuisine of various regions of Southern Italy: with pasta, topping for pizza, as a side dish, combined with pulses, also preserved sott'olio, in olive oil or frozen.

Why do I mention it on a page focused on wild edible and medicinal plants, you may ask?
It's because it self seeds very easily. You can find it rouge and abundant growing near once-upon-a-time vegetable patches and in olive groves. I found a patch like so, as always, by pure chance and collected what still could be useful, leaving plenty flowers to self seed again.

🧐Note the meaty stems and buds clusters, making cime easy to tell apart from other wild brassicae (all are edible in this genus so no worries about making a costly mistake👍). You may also notice that on 1 plant, there are 2 shapes of leaves (see the photos). The main leaves can also come in various forms and shapes, this being a cultivar with many varieties and I'm pretty sure, hybridizing too with other wild brassica.

I usually blanch the greens in salty water until half tender, drain and season with some fruit vinegar, chili or/and garlic olive oil. If you're planning to use them in fillings, frittata etc, you may want to skip the vinegar. Work great in soups and stir fries too. Or just munch on them raw😁 They freeze well blanched.

Happy foraging everyone 💚

08/03/2026

Violets (viola spp - I wish it was all odorata, the fragrant one, but I mostly encounter mammola and other less fragrant species🫤)
So pretty and frail. It's difficult to preserve their fragrance and colour so they can last and be used in the kitchen. I keep experimenting.

I tried:
LIQUEUR - it had an intense aroma of cheap air freshener and a very not pretty colour. I suppose the colour could be made pinkier using some acid, like lemon juice or citric acid. I used the liqueur up adding it to some ratafia, that worked well with very delicate floral aromas. I would not repeat it though
SYRUP - adding lemon juice sure made it pretty, it was pleasant to use while it lasted, which was about 5 months in the fridge. I find the flavour deteriorates with time, leaving mostly the "cheap air freshener" impression
SUGAR - both wet, simply violets with sugar blitzed in a blender with blades and dry, obtained by drying the moist mix and then grinding it into fine sugar in a coffe grinder.

I make a little batch of the wet sugar each spring. It adds beautiful colour and delicate aroma to a humble panna cotta, icecream or any other creamy dessert. The dry variation was more versatile as it was easier to blend into sweet creams, but less intense. Both processes make some of the delicate fragrance disappear. In both adding a little citric acid turns the colour more pink and makes it last longer. Either way, you can enjoy it for 5-6 months tops, kept in a tightly closed jar in the fridge.

❓❓If you've any tried and tested ideas on how to preserve violets, please do share!

Violets 💜 viola 💜 Spring flowers 💜 violet sugar

01/03/2026

Would you believe none of the ingredients were bought?

It's a perfect time of the year to appreciate flavours and textures of wild greens!

You can easily make 100% foraged salad at this time of the year. Not made of whatever is edible our there. Going gourmet. Picking the best there is. It will taste fantastic. I used:

🌱strigoli (great texture, pea flavour)
🌱calepina (raddish/rocket flavour, crunchy)
🌱wild mustard tops (spicy)
🌱some lachyrus tops (sweet, pea and liquorice) 🌱first few blossoms of sulla (sweetness, colour)
🌱fronds of wild fennel (herby, fresh).
Olive oil and quince vinegar, home picked/made. Salt & pepper, ok, bought.

Smallholding/foraged frittata: duck eggs, olive oil, a drop of goats milk, hard goats cheese - all home produced. Crow garlic, mint - foraged.

📣 And if you'd rather leave the sourcing and preparation of wild greens to me, you can still book our
WILD SPRING AT ILMONTE Lunch on Sunday March 22nd to taste it yourselves! Pm me for info or click on the FB link below:

https://www.facebook.com/share/1F4Xy413ZZ/

See you at !

21/02/2026

Tallow, olive oil and lavender soap - natural soap that nourishes your skin. And smells amazing. I used lavender infused olive oil picked by us, in addition to the essential oil.

I'm not giving a super detailed instruction on how to make it and what safety measures you must take - soap making is not very difficult but you must read on all things to pay attention to BEFORE attempting to make any. There are plenty excellent blogs and tutorials out there.

Here's my recipe, gives 12 bars of roughly 100g each.

TALLOW & OLIVE OIL LAVENDER SOAP

Beef tallow 270g (30%)
Olive oil 315g (35%)
Coconut oil (refined) 270g (30%)
Castor oil 45g (5%)

Water 254g
NaOH 127g
Essential oil lavandin 30g

Make lye by pouring cold water into a tall glass jar and then slowly adding measured off caustic soda. Stir the solution with a plastic spoon, glass or wooden stick. I'm using a disposable chopsticks. The lye gets very hot so once all is dissolved, put it in a cooler place to cool down. I put it out on the balcony.

Melt the fats over low heat, stirring, as the tallow melts at higher temperature. You don't want to go over 45-50C. Set aside to cool a bit, to roughly 40C.

Once both the lye and the fats are more or less at 40C, we're ready to combine them. Pour the fats into a tall jug (I'm using a food grade 3L plastic one). Submerge the stick blender but don't turn it on. Gently stirring (as if with a spoon), slowly pour the lye into the fats. Stir and pulse bend. More stirring than blending. The mixture will turn milky and will start thickening. Add essential oils and continue until the mixture gets creamy and uniform. Pour into the soap mold. Cover and leave to harden, this one took overnight. Cut and put away for at least 6 weeks to season. Then enjoy.

And if you'd rather purchase a ready soap, call into and pick what you like, or comment "SOAP" and I'll send you what is available. I can ship in Italy and abroad😊

Soap 🫧 Soap making 🫧 Cold process soap 🫧 Tallow 🫧 Olive oil soap 🫧 Natural cosmetics

12/02/2026

On PRIMROSE (primula vulgaris), from herbalist point of view.
This beautiful herb is popping up everywhere in damp, shady places now and has relatively short season. Read about its medicinal properties and decide if it could be beneficial for you!

🌼 Historically, primrose was used to treat hysteria, insomnia and ease cough fits. Modern science confirms traditional uses, the herb is used in many cough formulations, while the root stock finds its use as a calming remedy.

🌼 Active ingredients present in the plant have various medicinal actions:

SAPONINS help loosen mucus and ease dry coughs, so this action is helpful with bronchitis, colds, flu, chronic illnesses with cough

FLAVONOIDS offer their antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, helping your body deal with viral or bacterial infections (colds, flu)

PHENOLIC ACIDS and ESSENTIAL OILS, that's antimicrobial action and immune support, again, great when dealing with infections of upper respiratory tract. Additional benefits include relaxing mucous membranes, very useful in persistent cough.

Collect aerial parts and dry them.
🍵Make tea when you have a cold or flu. I use primrose in my Floral Flu Fighter tea together with coltsfoot, lungwort, elder flower, raspberry leaf, linden blossom.
🧴Infuse the dry herb in coconut or sweet almond oil (or tallow) for a few weeks and use to make an ointment that speeds up healing, eases chapped and dry skin and gently helps with atopic skin and psoriasis. You could also add chickweed here, both in season now and both gentle yet potent skin healing herbs.

For calming and sedative preparations, usually the root is used. As it is collected in autumn, we won't discuss it here.

👉I'll be making small amount of the healing ointment later on, for our family use. If you'd like to order a jar or 2, please let me know - I don't like wasting what Nature kindly offers so I won't be making loads😊

Happy foraging everyone!

Primrose 🌼Primula 🌼 Herbalism 🌼 Herbs for health 🌼 Natural healing 🌼 Natural remedies 🌼 Cold remedy 🌼 Foraging

11/02/2026

Looks like spring is on the way. Even though forecasts say winter is, too 🤔

I really missed being in the forest. Just staying there, walking, listening, breathing, seeing so much more now that barely anything green is growing around.
💜 And I saw. The first little spot of purple. And another. And again. Wild crocuses are already in bloom, that's up in higher hills, over 1000 m asl

We crossed a path, followed it for a while. It was damp, water trickling between rocks, mud around. I aways like to look for animal tracks in the mud. There were the usual, wild boar, possibly a deer. No wolf this time.
💛 And then my daughter spotted the first primrose. Another spot of colour in the gray and brown ground. I picked a few flowers, a few leaves - first herbs for the FFF herbal tea mix. Floral Flu Fighter.

🩷 There was another gorgeous flower on out way back - pulmonaria, the lungwort. So beautiful with its multicoloured blossom and spotted leaves. There were only 2 plants I saw so I left them alone. I've an abundant place elsewhere. Another plant for my tea.

💚 Go to the forest. Don't go looking for particular things, if you need anything, Nature will give it to you. Just go to breathe deeply, to listen to voices of nature, to calm your eyes, mind and soul. Go to just be in that place and time. Who knows what you'll see..

Forest * Forest walk * Spring herbs * Crocus * Primrose * Lungwort

07/02/2026

3 cheeses & wild greens 💚
This is the sort of food I love preparing for our guests at : nearly everything on this plate is made, picked or prepared by me.

All cheeses are 100% goat milk.

1. Halloumi, fried in our own olive oil, was served with cherry tomato relish with black mustard leaves for this spicy, fresh kick

2. Capri, maturing hard cheese, served on a bed of chickweed salad, with montepulciano wine reduction and pickled wild cherries

3. No-name cheese (in the phase of perfecting the recipe), light cheese with creamy centre, delicate white mushroom tasting skin, slightly runny between these 2 layers, served with wild quince fruit leather, wild grapes syrup and acidic oxalis leaf.

Which combination do you think you'd like best?

You can buy my cheeses and some preserves at our Farmhouse. Or pm me to book food experience with such starter 😊

06/02/2026

CHICKWEED (Stellaria media) - one of the best wild salad leaves of the season.

🌱It grows pretty much anywhere there's moisture and partial shade. I have it spilling out of flower pots, across the road, on every shaded path. The only places we don't have it at the Farmhouse are poultry pen (guess why😉 - chickweed) and south facing open ground.
I'm not sure why it's not widely consumed. It's easy to ID, abundant, common and has really nice flavour. Maybe it's time you tried it too?

🥗 Stellaria is crispy, tasting very green, refreshing, cooling. Like freshly picked spring lettuce. Pick tender tops, as the stems are fibrous. I made myself a tasty breakfast of stellaria, cottage cheese made yesterday, fresh radish and first mint leaves. Very good indeed and my body feels energized!

🤓Chickweed also has medicinal properties: it's high in antioxidants, is slightly diuretic, helping our bodies get rid of toxins, it is even tested for its potential in slowing down breast cancer cells growth.
⚗️In oil extracts, chickweed is quite successful in reducing skin inflammation in conditions like atopic skin, psoriasis, rashes and allergic reactions. I've made gentle goat milk and chickweed soap last year that helped toddlers with atopic skin and a woman with never healing hands, cracked from detergents. So yes, its soothing properties are tested first hand.

Go out there to look for chickweed, give it a taste. Enjoy the fresh, spring green flavour, try to imagine what you'd combine it with. If you lack inspiration, pop it in any salad or sandwich. Your body will thank you 😊 happy foraging!

03/02/2026

Today on a walk I spotted perfect wild mustard. I munched on a bit, picked a handful of tips. Crunchy, fresh, with just a hint of heat. Much like radish leaves I remember from my grandparents' allotment, with nicer texture.

So it happened, today we had home made goat kebabs. 1st time I made the "kebab" from spiced goat mince, in the oven. Just mince, khmeli suneli spice mix from Georgia (I absolutely love the aromas!), some dried mixed herbs I collected throughout last year, salt, an egg, that's it. The spicy greens matched the meat better than any lettuce. Both the meat and the mustard will feature on our table more often! Seeing both come from just beside our farmhouse. Literally 😁

29/01/2026

Winter fungi - auricularia, wood ear, jelly ear, black fungus.
This edible fungus grows on dead softish wood - usually elder, often mulberry, I've seen it on robinia too. Collecting from robinia can potentially be a bad idea though, some sources claim toxic substances present in robinia wood can be present in the fungus too.

I find collecting wood ear is easiest 2-3 days after rain, the fruiting bodies are firm, not jelly-like and take less time to dry. But sure don't hesitate and pick them off soft and damp, or even completely dry - the latter only if you're sure it's wood ear your looking at! They regrow season after season on the same trunk or branch.

I mostly use wood ear in stir fries, spring rolls and mushroom sauces. It's a wild ingredient that gives colour and texture, not flavour. Works great with rehydrated rice cakes, accompanied by other mushrooms: oyster, sh*take, honey fungus etc.
Recipe for the rice cakes inspired by recipe for scallion and steak rice cakes. Well worth a try, in either version!

Fungi🍄‍🟫 Edible mushrooms.🍄‍🟫Wild mushrooms🍄‍🟫. Funghi.🍄‍🟫Auricularia.🍄‍🟫Wood ear.

Forager in Italy

24/03/2026

18/03/2026

10/03/2026

08/03/2026

01/03/2026

21/02/2026

12/02/2026

11/02/2026

07/02/2026

06/02/2026

03/02/2026

29/01/2026

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