Primal Sacrament: The Joy of Wild Foods and Medicines
Sunday, June 29th, 2008
The air is heavy and the sky dark nearly all day long. The awaited monsoons are almost here, hovering just beyond the horizon and taunting us with long spikes of silver lightning stabbing the sky. The plants glory in the rare humidity and ripening berries weigh down the branches of Mulberry and Saskatoon trees. We are at the cusp of my favorite season, from now til October I’ll be in absolute heaven and loathe to step indoors away from the lush green beauty that the Monsoons bring.
While all four of us enjoy a huge variety of foods from different traditions, cultures and parts of the world, what we love most of is the intense, close to home nourishment of wild foods. Whether Sweet Clover pesto, creamy Nettle soup or smoked Elk, the taste of this land is like no other. The act of taking in the primal sacrament from what we ourselves are grown from provides us with a feeling of completion, of rightness and a deep sense of satisfaction. I’ve written on this subject before, most recently in my post The Forager’s Song over at the Medicine Woman’s Roots.
Loba’s been gathering Nettles, one batch at a time, and then cooking them down on the outdoor fire for storage in a friend’s freezer. Rhiannon loves helping with the plants and puts on her favorite leather gloves for the task of picking, sorting and processing the Nettles. And in my own spare moment, I relish harvesting huge armloads to carry home to the cabin kitchen. These nutrient rich greens are one our most important staples, along with Lamb’s Quarters and Beebalm. Every year, we harvest as much as possible and store them all away for the cold months ahead and then delight during Winter in our vibrant, delicious greens. We prefer doing as much of the cooking as possible outside during the Summer. There’s nothing like roasting fresh vegetables in the hot ashes of a burned down fires, or grilling a fine steak over red coals. The taste of the mountain air seems imbued in every bite, and all the more nourishing for the vital wildness of it.
Lately we’ve been enjoying a precious supply of fresh caught Cottontail, lovingly hunted and delivered into our hands by our dear Wolf. He regularly heads out into the dusk carrying his antique shotgun with Rhiannon tagging close behind to learn her Papa’s fine hunting skills. She’s also often the one to run to get the rabbit, picking up it’s soft body and whispering a thank you and kiss for its precious life.
Now, you may have heard that rabbit tastes just like chicken, but you heard wrong. And if you’ve ever had domestic rabbit, well, just disregard that. Wild rabbit is a creature until itself, and a plump young bunny makes a wonderful meal (or two) for our small family. While not possessing much in the way of fat, the meat is still tasty and can be surprisingly tender when properly prepared. The addition of pork belly, bacon, lard or other high quality fat increases tenderness, and soaking the meat in the fat can make for a much better grilling experience.
Last night we put together a delicious variation on Lapin Moutarde á la Créme, a rich, almost intoxicating rabbit stew. The original recipe called for pork belly and hard cider in the stock, but we substituted bacon, sauteed apples and a fine chardonnay with very tasty results. The light fruit flavor mingled delightfully with the mild taste of the rabbit. At the last, Loba added a generous splash of cream to the boiled down broth before adding back vegetables and meat. The soup was served over a bed of mixed greens and adorned with crumbled bacon, toasted pecans and finely chopped flat leaf parsley. Truthfully, I believe the recipe resulted in one of the finest broths I’ve ever tasted.
My own evolution of healing has taught me that my body most often prefers the simple fare of meat, veggies and berries, rich with wild greens and local game. These foods have the amazing effect of keeping me balanced, both emotionally and physically. I no longer have blood sugar spikes, chronic fatigue or digestive issues. Some people are horrified at the idea of a life without bread, rice or potatoes but I am delighted by the idea of a life without pain, exhaustion and insulin resistance. One of the wonderful things about this particular approach to eating, is that much of my diet can come directly from here. This wild bit of NM is not suited for intensive agricultural practices and gentle living with the earth means harvesting what is most abundant. Here, that’s greens, game and you guessed it, berries! In fact, tomorrow I’m heading over to a friend’s house to gather a (hopefully) abundant amount of Mulberries from her huge, prolific tree.
Another friend generously allowed me to pick some delicately scented petals from her old fashioned rose bush and this morning Rhiannon and I brewed up some delicious Rose elixir, and she even made her own small bottle of ruby colored magic to have on hand. Each of these every day experiences, from food gathering to medicine making, is filled with a quiet sense of the extraordinary. Of the miracle of each day, and the gratitude that weaves us all together.
~Kiva Rose
~All pics (c) 2008 Kiva Rose
For over two decades the Animá Center has subsisted almost entirely on donations, with only a few of our hundreds of published articles and books earning any money, and with us unwilling to treat this like a business or demand a fee. There has never been sufficient income for fire or health insurance, or even for regular dental work for the four of us living here, but somehow there has always been just enough donations of money, services or goods to keep it all working. While vehicles have sat unrepaired for months at a time, our apprentices, students, allies and supporters have made sure there continues to be working laptops and internet, crucial software and even special herbs for my liver.
Living as we do on the site of an ancient Mogollon village and ritual center, it’s easy to regularly imagine our predecessors as they walked about the same landscape as we do, stepping out of their recessed pit-houses as we spring from our little cabins into the same burst of forest green and skies blue. This time of year they would have been gathering the wild mustard and river watercress, and spreading stinging nettles and current berries out to dry. They would be looking forward to harvests of saskatoons and gooseberries like us, and be spending part of their day adding daubs of mud to the roof to help keep the family dry through the likely drench of August and July. Rhiannon has been asking about how to catch a rabbit to eat, which are at a population peak right now, and what comes to mind is the image of other dark headed urchins of an earlier time… walking proudly into camp with their contribution to dinner, a net bag of greens from mother’s wish list, and small slain fur bearers that had been properly thanked and kissed.
The photos you see here are of the Blue River, a usually creek-sized flow that runs from the White Mountains on the New Mexico/Arizona border, down through the sculpted red rocks of the Blue Range Wilderness Area. It’s hard to leave the Frisco River we love to drive the 40 miles of washboard-rutted road to get there, sliding sideways on the loose gravel with every hairpin turn. This particular spot is one that we find attractive enough to set aside a day’s projects for, with Loba and Rhiannon packing a picnic basket this time and Kiva anxious to try again to teach our little girl to swim. Waterfalls form where the Blue drops through solid rock, marked with red patterns reminiscent of native etched petroglyphs but drawn by no mortal hand. I enjoyed leaping off the highest cliff into the narrow gorge, and the sensation of the massaging torrent and swirling tickle of bubbles.
For all those reasons we can be found increasingly close to home, and thus close to the very heart of our work and purpose. When we do leave to give presentations it is to regional, land-based events such as those at 3-Sided Whole in Central New Mexico, or to cities within a days drive such as El Paso, Santa Fe, Albuquerque or Tucson, where our excellent student and herbalist Darcey (desertmedicinewoman.blogspot.com) and our ally Allison are helping to network. And when we stay, it will be with the possibility of hosting Resident Student Interns as well as Retreat guests, and the certainty of being able to give more time to our growing number of Correspondence Course students.
It was hard for an Apache-raised girl to understand, how some could see the planet as but a lifeless rock, upon whose surface a bounty was distributed for the good of man. Who saw animals not as spirits but as steaks, fur and wool, pet or threat. Who saw trees only as lumber to be turned into buildings or offer shade from the sun, who judged plants as being decorative or itchy, weeds or crops.
June in the canyon is usually one of the hottest months, windless and still like no other time of the year. June 2008 has been anything but, with relatively cool temperatures and Spring-like winds billowing and blustering from midday until after dark. More typical are the short nights as we near the Summer Solstice, with even here in a narrow canyon the sun tops the cliffs above the river by 7 A.M., and doesn’t set on the Westerly rim until 7 in the evening. And as every June, the young of various species are seen paraded around by their proud mothers and clans, with baby ducks cloistering close to protective rock our wild turkeys all puffed up over the 11” high offspring fussing to keep up. This is when the elk move down from the ridges and into the cottonwood and willow thickets lining the singing water, pods of browsing females watching over calves just now big enough to feed on their own. They prance through patches of the equally young blackberry, elderberry and hawthorne starters that Kiva and Loba planted, encouraged along by the alert community of females.
Soon to be 8-yr. old Rhiannon and I went upriver together yesterday evening, stopping to sit next to each other on chair-sized rock shelves jutting out of a rock cliff next to the water. Our normally chatty daughter grew silent looking at the shifting patterns of wave and light coursing before us, head canted otter-like to better hear the river murmurs and the wind’s call to hush. Besides the elk squeals and all the other recognizable wildlife sounds, we were also excited by the calls of birds for which we had no name. For all the effort we put into identifying and becoming familiar with our neighbor creatures, there is something special about that which we can as yet put no name on. These mystery sounds indicate a continuous influx of once extirpated, now returning species, as well as the northwards expansion of certain southern populations as the Southwest’s climate changes. And even more, they are a chance for us to be surprised, delighted not just by what we know, but by the limitless fact and wonder of the unknown.
We’ve so enjoyed the comments of our blog readers, students and supporters, that we’ve decided to invite your participation in periodic surveys. The process of replying can further self understanding, inspire commitments to new ways of seeing and being, as well as allow you to share your stories with others in the growing Anima community. We’ll start with the topic of nourishment, something we are quick to afford others but too seldom provide ourselves. You can upload your comment directly by going to this post on the blog site, or email us at mail@animacenter.org and we will compile the responses for publishing here.
We normally think of basil as THE pesto plant, but if you expand your idea of what pesto can be, a whole range of possibilities emerges. Pesto can be made with any pungent leafy herb, like oregano, clover (sweet clover much preferred to red clover), marjoram, mint, and of course basil, and all its relations! You can also make pesto with fresh nettles, believe it or not, and with dandelion greens, or wild mustard! Try mixing in fresh sage, thyme, or rosemary in smaller quantities, as well. I used to always make my pesto on my thousands-of years old stone metate, but ever since my parents gifted me with a wonderful glass and steel blender, I’ve been mainly using that. It makes a large batch of pesto in a very short time. When Kiva and I know we’ll be harvesting lots and lots of “pesto greens”, we stock up on gallon tins of extra virgin olive oil and bulk nuts ahead of time, so we can make several batches anytime. We come back from walking up the wash with armloads of bee balm, daydreaming of the yummies to come! We love this pesto on sandwiches, in tortillas, curries, on rice, in stews and soups and of course in pasta dishes and on garlic toast, and homemade flatbread!
