Do-It-Yourself food on the Camino

[Bridget and Peter]

it is not a good idea to encourage 'picking' of any kind.

But confining ourselves to what's available in stores is way too limited, IMHO. Food doesn't come prewrapped in cellophane on a styrofoam tray.

Best pudding (dessert) on Camino:

stewed windfall apples (on camp site)and blackberries (hedgerow pickings), sprinkled with crunchy oat cereal and a good dollop of yoghurt, or creme fraiche, or similar.

Yum Yum!

Happy discovery for a simple and quick main course:

pasta, and chopped courgettes (zucchini) cooked together, drained, then stir in a pack of soft cheese with garlic and herbs.

Also yum yum!


Other 'one pot' meals, anyone?

 

[Deleted member 3000]

In the fall the wild fig trees provide a bounty (this does not include the fig trees in folks' yards in town), as do the chestnut trees.

 

[Telluridewalker]

Since it's Spring, I'll mention that dandelion greens are tasty, nutrient filled and everywhere! The sooner you harvest the greens (try to get them before the flowers appear) the less bitter they will be. Use common sense and avoid areas where herbicide/fertilizer may be sprayed (lawn, park) or where dogs roam (imagine having the world as your bathroom!).

Feliz Primavera!

 

[sillydoll]

Most of the apples that fall from the trees are collected and used to make jams, preserves and juices. Probably so tasty because they are used worms and all!

 

[Bridget and Peter]

Most of the apples that fall from the trees are collected and used to make jams, preserves and juices.

Sil, are you really suggesting we should not eat windfalls found beside the road or on some other common ground? Does this apply to any hedgerow harvest - nuts, berries etc - anywhere?

I promise you, the windfall apples I picked up in France were surrounded by others which had not been picked up and were rotting away. I am sure I was not depriving anyone of their rightful pickings.

Granted, I have not yet been in Spain at apple time, but in France (and England, come to that) there are plenty of wild apple trees in hedge rows which are not part of anyone's orchard and which my tender conscience allows me to pocket (or front basket, actually, as a cyclist).

And, sadly, the art of jam making etc is rapidly dying out and there are fewer and fewer people like me who do it (not on the Camino, though - the jam thermometer weighs too much!).

And even in MY garden, there are more windfalls that rot on the ground than get stewed and frozen for later apple crumbles, or turned into Japple Jelly from apples mixed with the quince-like japonica fruit make a much more flavoursome jelly than apples alone. There's also 'Crab-onica' and 'Cramson' but I have to raid a friend's garden for the crab-apples and the damsons. I've yet to try Slapple jelly, although I have made Sloe Gin from the hedge rows near home....

and my elderflower champagne is an old family recipe passed on from mother to daughter ...

I was also introduced to sucking the nectar from clover and white nettle flowers as a child - probably to distract me from whining on long walks, now I think about it. Was that just resourceful thinking on the part of my parents, or did anyone else have that experience?

I only once tried nettles though.... are dandelion leaves any better?

 

[sillydoll]

Our 'man on the camino' Gordon Bell posted this request last year:

miscellaneous-topics/topic4072.html

Please ask pilgrims to refrain from picking grapes, apples etc. from vineyards and orchards, not only because it is offensive to the Spanish through whose land we walk, but some small farmers rely on these crops for their living.

Gordon is a South African who lives for 6 months of the year in Vilacha - a couple of km before Portomarin - where he is renovating an old house. Some of you might have enjoyed his hospitaltiy, whether it be personally, or via his honesty cooler-box that he leaves on a table outside his house for pilgrims to enjoy. He will be embarking on a road trip with Margi Biggs this May to distribute green litter bags to albergues along the camino.

 

[Bridget and Peter]

Please ask pilgrims to refrain from picking grapes, apples etc. from vineyards and orchards, not only because it is offensive to the Spanish through whose land we walk, but some small farmers rely on these crops for their living.

Picking or gathering (stealing) fruit or other produce from farms, gardens, orchards or vineyards - NO! NO! NO!

In the fall the wild fig trees provide a bounty (this does not include the fig trees in folks' yards in town), as do the chestnut trees.

stewed windfall apples (on camp site)and blackberries (hedgerow pickings), sprinkled with crunchy oat cereal and a good dollop of yoghurt, or creme fraiche, or similar.

Gathering wild foods from woods and hedgerows - so long as you are very careful you are not taking what is someone else's, or poisonous, or likely to be polluted - OK!

Is that clear enough?

 

[Timo]

Hello,
if you feel the need of vitamin C you could eat spruce spring greens, the light green ones. Or to go to the extreme, you could dig out cattail roots from the shore, wash them and eat them as poor man asparagus.
-T-

 

[Timo]

hello,
I checked few other things too, the common nettle (urtica dioica) is usable but you have wash them first and then you can use them like spinach, lots of minerals to avoid cramps. There is also a common garden flower, aquilega vulgaris, the flowers are eatible and they´ll take the the feel of thirst away. In case you have time to stay for a while you can make dandelion mead. You need young dandelion leaves, hot water and sugar. Infuse ahd enjoy, the vikings did it about thousand years ago...
-T-

 

[Anniesantiago]

My goodness! Just take 2 euros and buy a roll and some cheese or fruit!
Food in the tiendas is NOT that expensive!

 

[Timo]

Annie,
you´ve got it! When in Northern woods you´ve got live what you got. In the civilized word there´s always somebody to provide the goods.
-T-

 

[Telluridewalker]

I wonder if anyone has joined the harvest while on the Camino. I suppose the farmers along the way could always use the help- I understand in France many of the urban dwellers take a few weeks off in the fall to help with the harvest. Has anyone done so in Spain?

I spent a day helping my friend harvest cherries one fall in Western Colorado. It was really hard work and really helped me to appreciate what it takes to get our food to the table.

 

[MermaidLilli]

I stayed in Jato's Ave Fenix for 3 days due to my ankle and he had as guests some pilgrims who he allowed to live there while they worked in the grape harvests. They were doing it for money they needed to move on.
I thought that was very hospitable of Jesus Jato. For them and for me.
Lillian

 

[Timo]

Hello,
that sounds ideal way to everybody. A win win situation. I think this was happening in the middle age too.
-T-

 

[Anniesantiago]

Bacalau

Mmmmmm... yesterday, I found some dried salted codfish at a market.

I broke it apart, soaked it all day in water, changing the water several times- then poached it, breaking it in even smaller pieces. It was a boneless filet.

THEN... I changed the water again, and while it poached...

I sauteed one onion, chopped
two cloves garlic, minced
1 red pepper, chopped


when those were soft, I added two chopped tomatos, and let it all stew a bit.

Then I added the fish and about 1-2 cup of rice, and enough water to cover it all.

I popped a lid on and in about 20 minutes, I had the BEST dinner ever!

People were streaming into the kitchen, saying, ¨MAN, that smells good!¨

I felt guilty because I did not have enough to share :lol:



I have used the same combination of onion, garlic, pepper, and tomatoe, adding a small can of tuna and a cup of dried macaroni, then covering with water... it makes a GREAT dinner for 2 or 3
people.

All you need is a bit of bread and a glass of wine...

 

[Telluridewalker]

I love bacalao!

There's a standard song in Spanish (a samba, I think) called "Te Conozco Bacalao", which translated literally means: "I know you salted codfish." I never knew what the heck it meant at the time, but now I know it is an idiom that means, "I know what you're about- you can't fool me."

My mouth is watering from a distance...

 

[alexwalker]

Annie,

I have heard that a good housewife in Spain should know 365 varieties of that dish :roll:

Spain, Italy, Portugal and Brazil are all big importers of dried, salted codfish from Norway. Here it is kalled klippfisk (cliff fish) because, in the old days, it was salted and spread out on the cliffs to dry. Today, it's industrial producting. Climate in Norway makes for the top quality, which is why it is a good export trade for Norway.

And yes, it is a delicasy: I make it myself now and then :wink:

In my backpack I had 500 grams of dried (only, no salt) cod when I started, as emergency rations: Equivalent of 5 kgs fresh cod, and it won't spoil. I sometimes shared some with locals over a beer: It surely made me some new frieends: They appreciated it much as "raw" bacalao.

As for easier ways of cooking, I sometimes bought a chorizo (good sausage), a can of beans/other canned stuff, mixed it all, and had bread and wine with it: A complete and tasty dinner for 3-4 Euros. If that's too difficult you can always buy a bag of potato chips; add a sixpack of cold beer, and you have a healthy, tasty and nutricious meal :wink: