Join John Kallas, Wild Food Adventures, and Trackers Earth as we celebrate the release of John’s new book: “Edible Wild Plants: Wild Foods From Foraging to Feasting”. This is the second volume in his successful Wild Food Adventures book series.
The program includes a free educational slide presentation about edible wild plants, informational handouts, a book signing, demonstrations by Trackers Earth, and general hobnobbing.
In this beautiful, colorful slide presentation, Dr. Kallas shows how to identify, harvest and prepare nutritious, delicious, and abundant edible wild plants found within walking distance of your kitchen. He shows you features that make for effective learning in any wild food book. And ends with a short video.
This presentation is a sampling of the content of John Kallas’ new book: Edible Wild Plants: Wild Foods From Foraging to Feasting. Volume 2 of the Wild Food Adventure series. May 16 is the international release date for the book. You all will be seeing it for the first time. The presentation will be followed by a question and answer period and a book signing.
Edible Wild Plants, Volumes 1 & 2 are ground-breaking: They are the first books to make wild foods understandable and usable by the general public—including gardeners, chefs, dieters, home cooks and nutrition-minded consumers. John makes it fun and easy to learn about foods you’ve unknowingly passed by all your life. He provides you with gobs of useful photographs as well as the knowledge and confidence to begin eating and enjoying these foods.
While the focus of the day is on volume 2, both volumes focus on abundant and nutritious wild greens, vegetables, roots, flowers, fruits, and seeds eaten by our North American and European ancestors. All these plants are found in the Pacific Northwest and all of North America. They also provide the healthy wild foods that are the core of the true Mediterranean Diet. These books reveal how easy it is to incorporate wild foods into everyday modern life.
Volumes 1 and 2, signed by the author, will be available for preview and/or purchase. List price is $28, but we are offering them at sliding scale for those that need it: $25-$30, you decide on what you can afford. Cash, check, or credit card accepted. You can get ahead of the pack by buying a book before the presentation, or wait until you’ve seen the presentation. No purchase necessary, you can just look if you want. By buying the books here you support the author, avoid shipping costs, and you can get started right away.
Trackers Earth, Portland is hosting the event and will have outdoor skill instructors available for demonstrations and questions.
Free 2023 information factsheets about Wild Food Adventure Workshops and Trackers Earth classes for adults and children will be available. Trackers might have instructors demonstrating outdoor skills they teach.
We have a 7:15pm presentation start time. Plan ahead for traffic, parking, and seating. We hope that we are far enough from rush hour that Portland traffic will not be too congested.
Parking: Will be a problem the later you arrive. Try to arrive between 6:25 and 6:45pm. You may prefer to park blocks away in the surrounding neighborhoods. if you are cutting it close, consider parking in the neighborhoods north of Holgate: Think Reynolds St or 12th and 15th Avenues. Milwaukie Ave in front of Trackers near presentation time will be quite congested and slow you down.
Seating: Trackers auditorium is designed mostly for skill development not large presentations. They only have perhaps 60 seats for early arrivers. Otherwise you might have to stand to watch the presentation. The solution, of course, is to bring your own seat. Since we expect a big crowd, you could help by bringing your own stools, fold-up or otherwise narrow chairs (ones WITHOUT arm-rests) if you have them. Resin chairs and some folding camping chairs are NOT good since they flair out to the sides (for arm rests or holding beverages) and take up a lot of space. Think: narrow, narrow, narrow. Arrive early to get a good vantage point. There will be standing room only once the seating is full. People with chairs will be situated in front of the standing room area.
John Kallas has investigated edible wild plants since 1970 and taught about them since 1978. A trained botanist, nature photographer, writer, researcher, and teacher, Dr. Kallas has a doctorate in Nutrition, a Masters in Education, and majors in Biology and Natural Science. He founded Wild Food Adventures, The Institute for the Study of Edible Wild Plants & Other Foragables in 1993 and was the primary writer and editor of the Wild Food Adventurer newsletter. He published Edible Wild Plants: Wild foods From Dirt to Plate in 2010; volume 1 of his book series. For more information about John, go here.
