{"id":515,"date":"2015-01-13T14:44:43","date_gmt":"2015-01-13T13:44:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/?page_id=515"},"modified":"2015-05-15T12:31:54","modified_gmt":"2015-05-15T10:31:54","slug":"of-plums-and-pignuts-book-review","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/?page_id=515","title":{"rendered":"Of Plums and Pignuts book review"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Thanks to Alan Carter of the \u00a0&#8220;of Plums and Pignuts&#8221; blog fame for this nice review:<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"wp-embedded-content\" data-secret=\"nlKqzmlicJ\"><p><a href=\"https:\/\/scottishforestgarden.wordpress.com\/2014\/11\/23\/around-the-world-in-80-plants\/\">Around the World in 80&nbsp;Plants<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" class=\"wp-embedded-content\" sandbox=\"allow-scripts\" security=\"restricted\" style=\"position: absolute; visibility: hidden;\" title=\"&#8220;Around the World in 80&nbsp;Plants&#8221; &#8212; Of Plums and Pignuts\" src=\"https:\/\/scottishforestgarden.wordpress.com\/2014\/11\/23\/around-the-world-in-80-plants\/embed\/#?secret=h9wNhjATha#?secret=nlKqzmlicJ\" data-secret=\"nlKqzmlicJ\" width=\"600\" height=\"338\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<header class=\"entry-header\">\n<h1 class=\"entry-title\">Around the World in 80\u00a0Plants<\/h1>\n<div class=\"entry-meta\"><span class=\"sep\">Posted on <\/span><a title=\"10:19 pm\" href=\"https:\/\/scottishforestgarden.wordpress.com\/2014\/11\/23\/around-the-world-in-80-plants\/\" rel=\"bookmark\"><time class=\"entry-date\" datetime=\"2014-11-23T22:19:25+00:00\">23\/11\/2014<\/time><\/a><\/div>\n<\/header>\n<div class=\"entry-content\">\n<p>In what promises to be the publishing event of the year for edible-plant geeks, Stephen Barstow\u2019s long-awaited book <em>Around the World in 80 Plants<\/em> has finally hit the online bookshelves. Stephen is a pioneer of perennial vegetables: in 2003 he was dubbed \u2018Extreme Salad Man\u2019 after creating a salad using 537 varieties of plants. I can\u2019t claim to be an impartial reviewer of the book, having been so keen to get it that I didn\u2019t so much drop hints as specify it outright to my family as Christmas approached. Having now read it, I wasn\u2019t disappointed.<\/p>\n<p>In some ways <em>80 Plants<\/em> is quite a limited book. It deals purely with edible perennial plants in which the leaves, shoots or flowers are the main crop. Within this range it makes no attempt to be a comprehensive textbook: ground that has been well trodden by reference works such as Ken Fern\u2019s <i>Plants for a Future <\/i>or Martin Crawford\u2019s <i>Creating a Forest Garden<\/i> is left alone. Instead it picks up where these books leave off, with the plants and uses of plants that they neglect. On this territory you couldn\u2019t wish for a better guide. Stephen is a comprehensive researcher: he has read obscure historical sources about these plants, he has grown them in his garden and he has cooked and eaten them.<\/p>\n<p>Like many of the species covered, the book criss-crosses the line between foraging and cultivation as we are taken on a tour of the temperate world\u2019s foraging, growing and culinary traditions. In contrast to most books in this field, written by authors whose experience comes from the warmer end of this island, Stephen\u2019s knowledge comes from a rocky garden near Trondheim in Norway, just shy of the Arctic Circle, making it thoroughly Scotland-proof. I also appreciated Stephen\u2019s taste-buds. Many foraging and forest gardening books take what I can only call a generous view of the palatability of many plants and I have often spent much effort tracking down a plant that turns out to be, for me at least, inedible. Stephen is quick to say when a plant is bitter or needs some special preparation to make it edible.<\/p>\n<p>While only a small proportion of the plants were completely new to me, I learned at least one thing new about each. I now have a list of new ways to try many of my existing plants as well as a list of (yet more!) plants to acquire.<\/p>\n<p>The book is currently available at a special offer price from the publisher, <a title=\"Permanent Publications\" href=\"http:\/\/permanentpublications.co.uk\/around-the-world-in-80-plants-the-inspiring-edible-adventure\/\" target=\"_blank\">Permanent Publications<\/a>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Thanks to Alan Carter of the \u00a0&#8220;of Plums and Pignuts&#8221; blog fame for this nice review: Around the World in 80&nbsp;Plants Around the World in 80\u00a0Plants Posted on [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"cybocfi_hide_featured_image":"","footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-515","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/515","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=515"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/515\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":520,"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/pages\/515\/revisions\/520"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.edimentals.com\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=515"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}