Wondering what I ate during my year of growing and foraging 100% of my food?
If yes, then this page is for you!
This year I grew over 100 different foods and foraged nearly 200, totaling over 300 different foods. Thats a new food for nearly every day of the year! I have listed every food that I ate during the year.
I have split the list into three sections: foods that I grew in Florida, foods that I foraged in Florida and foods that I foraged during my trip to the Great Lakes region. I do not have any specific order, however the two sections are generally in order of foods that I ate first in the year and I also started off listing the foods that I had eaten the most. I’ve only sampled many of the foods listed, others are staples that I ate daily or multiple times per week.
This page does not explain the meals and dishes that I create with the food that I grow and forage. I have only listed each species (or as some would say, ingredient).
You can read my daily log of what I ate here.
You can see a photo documentation of my staple meals and foods here.
You can click on the foods that are linked to learn more about them.
My primary sources of knowledge for foraging in Florida were:
Green Deane (Eat the Weeds) – His YouTube channel and website are a plethora of information.
Peggy Lantz’s book – Florida’s Edible Wild Plants: A Guide to Collecting and Cooking
Andy Firk – His experts page lists over 50 Florida experts that you can learn from.
In Wisconsin, I checked out a few books from the library, but my primary resources were Sam Thayer‘s books The Forager’s Harvest and Nature’s Garden.
Foods that I grew in Florida:
sweet potato (white, purple and orange varieties)
yuca/cassava (roots and leaves)
yam (Dioscorea alata– multiple varieties- purple and white flesh)
papaya (unripe green and ripe orange and seeds)
serrano pepper (green and red)
Southern peas
honey
purple top turnips
red meat specialty radish
daikon radish
sunflower seeds
Everglades tomato
passion fruit
green beans
carrot
onion (bulbing)
cucumber
kohlrabi
celery
ghost pepper
eggplant
jun
honey wine
bell pepper
borage
pomegranate
bees wax, bee pollen, bee propolis
Plecranthus barbatus
Yardlong bean
potato
Perennial greens: moringa, katuk, Okinawa spinach, longevity spinach, Suriname spinach, cranberry hibiscus, purslane, chaya, sweet potato greens, malibar spinach, garden sorrel, Haitian basket vine, Brazilian spinach
Annual greens: roselle/ Jamaican Sorrel (leaves and flowers), collards, kale, arugula, Swiss chard, green wave mustard greens, scarlett frills mustard greens, chicory, lettuce (multiple types), cabbage (green and red), broccoli, paracicaba sprouting broccoli, purple choi sum flowering brassica/ kosaitai, yu choy, tsoi sum, nasturtium, pak choy (2 varieties), Plantago, amaranth (grain and leaves)
Herbs: African blue basil, Cuban oregano, holy basil (2 types), garlic chive, bunching/ green onion, mint (multiple types), rosemary, lemon grass, Italian basil, Thai basil, papalo, ginger, turmeric, green tea, cilantro, garlic greens, dill, fennel, thyme, oregano, tarragon, curry leaf tree, chamomile, garlic, lemon bee balm, parsley, Costa Rican bush mint, yerba buena, lemon balm, sage, dill seeds, coriander, mustard seeds, lavender
Foods that I foraged in Florida:
rain water
sea salt and ocean water
starfruit
lemons
fish (mullet, striped mojarra, shad, crappie, sheepshead, sand perch, largemouth bass, sail catfish, bowfin, sea trout, redfish, crevasse jack, fish eggs)
avocado
apple (foraged in Wisconsin)
grapefruit
reishi mushroom
seaweed (multiple varieties)
pine needles (for tea)
perennial peanut (flowers)
tamarind
monkey orange
Barbados gooseberry
sapodilla
white sapote (two types)
chanterelle (two types)
java plum
bacteria (many different species)
yeast (many different species)
insects (I certainly ate some insects in the large volume of greens I ate. I’m sure I ate ants, aphids and other small insects.)
Foods that I foraged on Great Lakes region trip (07/13/19 – 10/04/19)
fruits- apple, crab apple, plum, pear, blueberry, huckleberry, serviceberry, raspberry, blackberry, mulberry, wild strawberry, tart cherry, sand cherry, pin cherry, chokecherry, wintergreen berry, grape, Aronia (chokeberry), false solomon’s seal, hackberry, mountain ash, American nightshade
mushrooms- chanterelle, cinnabar chanterelle, lobster, hedgehog, bolete, oyster, combs tooth, pheasant’s tail, chicken of the woods, hen of the woods, honey mushroom, puffball (3 species), shaggy mane, porcini, stinkhorn, Suillius
greens- dandelion, amaranth, wood nettle, wild mustard, plantago, wood sorrel, sheep’s sorrel, heal all, lady’s thumb, ox eye daisy, clover, creeping Charlie, hawkweed, wood violet, lambs quarter, purslane, mint, honewort, sow thistle, cow parsnip, sochan, curly dock, Virginia waterleaf, hairy wood mint, winter cress, water cress, garlic mustard, stinging nettle
fish- lake trout, largemouth bass, smallmouth bass, Northern pike, walleye, rock bass, bullhead, sucker, rainbow trout, perch, whitefish
wintergreen (berry and greens)
balsam sap and leaves
spruce leaves
goldenrod
horseradish
deer meat (venison), fat and bone broth (found deer on roadside, hit by car)
rose hip
butternut
hickory nut
acorn
wild garlic
Echinacea (purple cone flower)
cat nip
bee balm
wild parsnip
wild carrot
lotus nut
wild rice
acorn grubs
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Cover photo by Sierra Ford Photography
