Edible Leeds - Wild Food Foraging Courses and 4 Wild Seasons Pop Up Dining Events

Japanese Quince is one of my autumn favourites and one I make a beeline for every year. You can read more about these delightfully scented,  mouth-puckering and fabulously versatile little fruits here:  https://edible-leeds.blogspot.com/2017/11/quince-quince-glorious-quince.html   Japanese Quince Jelly   This beautifully sharp, sweet and dreamily aromatic jelly is one of the creations that go into my JQ Knickerbocker Glory, it also works well spread on to warm toast or served alongside game meats, particularly wildfowl and is great added to sauces to provide an edge of acidity, sweetness and aromatic attitude. There are many other applications for this jelly, so get busy gathering, creating and playing... 1kg Japanese Quince 750g Golden Granulated Sugar Water Wash the fruits to remove any dirt and then place them whole in a large pan. Add water to cover, (approximately 800ml) and bring to the boil, once boiling, reduce heat and simmer until all the fruits split. Po...

A young and still forming Hen of the Woods. Hen Of The Woods aka Grifola frondosa, is a late summer to autumn featuring fungus. It's generally found growing at the base of Oak trees, often older more mature specimens but not strictly so and less frequently found with Beech. Made up of numerous tiered brackets ranging in colour from dark grey/black/purple, to chestnut brown on the topside of the bracket and consisting of white/cream coloured undersides sporting firm sponge-like pores. These brackets hide the more bulky base and central section which is firm, solid and white, this too makes good eating and preserving. It has a desirable aroma of mild mushroom, nuttiness & earthiness, taste wise it rocks! Hen of the Woods is also known for its medicinal qualities, reportedly attracting, binding to and removing heavy metals from the human body - bet your doctor never told you that! In Japan they go by the name of Maitake and you may hear them referred to as such even in the...

My first encounter with Japanese Quince was as a child. There was a particular house, with a low-down brick wall bordering its garden and each year it would produce these small green fruits (as you will soon learn, I never actually saw them ripen!), I thought they were a strange species of lime and they were great for random acts of  mischief;  if only I'd known and if only I'd cared! Japanese Quince - Chaenomeles japonica - are one of several species of ornamental quince in the family, Rosaceae. They're much smaller than the pear shaped quince - Cydonia oblonga - that  grow on trees.   They're generally found randomly tucked away in suburban gardens or as border and screen plantings in and around municipal buildings and their grounds; though not solely and exclusively at these aforementioned locations. Regardless of where they reside, providing there is no risk of contamination, to stumble upon a decent crop of ripe n ready quince, is in my opinion an absolute...