- [Narrator] This program made possible by Forest River.

(soft upbeat music) We have always been dedicated to helping people experience the joy of the outdoors, by building a full range of recreational vehicles.

At Forest River, your needs, interest and lifestyle, are at the forefront of everythi Forest River, "Follow the River.

To learn more, visit ForestRiver - Hey there, you're about to watch another wonderful episode of "Wild Harvest."

Now, of course I will show you s and some tips for local foraging and the gathering of wild edible but the reality is and the truth you must do your own homework.

There is no replacement, for lea and gaining the experience and k that will give you 100% accuracy on touching, and picking, and eating the wild edibles.

And the only way to do that, is to turn to the books, turn to the material online, and most importantly, find a good, experienced, and knowledgeable local forger, and take a course with them.

Then you'll be confident in your own wild harvest.

All right, let's go enjoy some g (soft piano music) Know what I love about, (breathe gathering wild edible plants?

It's that no matter where I find whether that's at the edge of a parking lot, harvesting wild carrots in the middle of some city, or out here at a beautiful and remote fishing lodge, hoping to land a rainbow trout.

Either way, as you look down, and you discover and become fami with all of the plants around yo you will see that all you are doing is forging locally.

Locality, the geography, wherever it is you find yourself the reality is, that local forag is the key to the wild harvest.

(soft piano music) (bright upbeat music) (soft upbeat music) (water splashing) (soft upbeat music) (camera clucks) Money bite right there.

(fishing rod whooshing) (soft piano music) Woohoo!

Yeah, that's it.

(soft piano music) That's what I'm talking about.

(soft piano music) Beautiful as a rainbow.

Dinner.

(soft piano music) (wind whooshing) Yeah, those are salmonberry.

They're not, I mean they'll be ready later but they're not ready now.

- Nice flowers.

- Yeah they're beautiful.

Oh, oh, oh, oh, hey.

Here we go.

Oh.

Perfect.

This is lady fern.

Athyrium Felix-Femina.

Don't even try it.

Don't even tr It took me long enough to get that to roll off the tongue.

It is lady fern, and it is also You hear often about eating the young shoots of a plant.

So the young shoots in the case are their fiddleheads.

Now here's the thing about eating fiddleheads, at least in the case of lady fer and also sword fern, which I see around here, they can be toxic if they're not They have a substance called thi and it breaks down the vitamin B - [Paul] Interesting.

- So we don't want to eat it raw just in a salad.

You're going to wanna blanch it, or cook it or change water, however you want to do it.

But one way or the other, you're gonna need to cook this p - Okay.

- All right.

Now here's the catc When you come to picking it, what you wanna watch out for is that is a hand span like if you just put your hand like t in height or taller, just leave it.

- Okay.

- Here are the ones you want.

These little beauties right here All right.

So that's what we're looking for.

Now you should be able to just p with your hand like that.

If you take too many of those fi you actually take too much energy away from the rhizome, and the plant dies.

So in this case, the recommendation is no more than three per plant, which means let's take only two - [Paul] Okay.

- Being a vascular plant, ferns have neither seeds nor flo only spores, and you can find th wherever it rains a lot throughout the world.

(soft piano music) All right, let's take a look at (leaves rustling) This is more of what I was looki Polystichum Munitum, which is Western sword fern.

- [Paul] Okay.

- All right.

You can see the difference in size of this compared to the lady fern.

Now, here's our little fiddlehea and I want you to maintain proper harvesting.

They say you can take up to 1/2 of the fiddleheads.

Let's not do that.

Let's just ta - Okay.

- There's so many around here, if you just go around and just t two fiddleheads from each one, that's good harvesting.

- Yup.

- You can see also there's such a drastic difference between the lady fern fiddlehead and these Western sword fern fid - The color on these is amazing.

They've got this sort of gold bronzy shine.

Like I can't really describe it.

- [Les] They look furry too.

Rig - Yeah.

- So now don't worry about the brown flakes.

You can leave them on or you can take it off depending on, how you want it to look in the dish I suppose.

So obviously you've worked with fiddleheads before in the kitchen I don't know what chef hasn't, but, Western sword fern and lady that's gotta be new.

- Yeah.

I've never seen these.

These look different, like right away, they're lighter Their texture is kind of similar on the lady fern, like when I rub it in my fingers - Yeah.

- But this is new to me, so who It's gonna be interesting to fin (soft piano music) Well, that was a nice one.

(soft piano music) (wind whooshing) Now this is one magical world.

I've had such a good experience everywhere I've been.

I've been able to enjoy the mome embrace the surroundings and really dial in to where I am.

One thing I can't share, it's th and the sensation of having all of this green around me and that extra bump of where it's invigorating, it's also relaxing.

I've got a lot of thinking to do about how I handle familiar ingr I'm not necessarily 100% comfortable just cooking and going forward with the fiddl without playing with them a litt They're different than what I've that's all there is to it.

I've got to think my way around and then of course the trout, those little guys are precious, and I wanna make sure that I han with a very, very delicate hand.

Somewhere in all of this, it's still more so about finding the balance.

(soft piano music) - This is beautiful.

What a beautiful feast.

Tell me what you're thinking.

I gotta know, now that you know what you're dealing with.

- Well, looking at the fiddlehea the fact that I've never played with these ones before, I've got a learning curve.

These guys I'm really curious what it's like underneath, and what happens to this feather sort of outer coating on it.

- [Les] It's like fur, isn't it?

- Yeah.

And then the trout, something about fresh caught trout that the word respect, comes to mind.

- Why?

- For two reasons, life has been given for us to en So I wanna make sure that life has been celebrated, and the flavor's so delicate and these fish are small.

So my instinct is to use a very in how I treat them, not really going for big, bold f but really to accentuate what's - You know I wanna capitalize on something you just said.

This was a life given, for our lives.

I just think that we have to look at all of the life here, the fish and the ferns as a life-giving for us.

There's so much research being done right now on what they consider the sentience of plants.

It's a hard thing for a lot of people to swallow.

We want to look at them like the or pieces of wood.

They're living beings as well.

I think the same way that the fi - [Paul] Yeah.

- And we have to give them all the respect.

(soft piano music) There's a lot to really read through and to figure out when you're dealing with ferns.

There's so many beautiful ferns, and they vary in many ways.

This is a time when I find that feel comes into play.

With ferns, check out how they f and notice are they feathery lik are they hairlike, are they cour And are they sharp?

And that's one way to get to know a plant as well.

It's not all just sight, and parts of the plant.

It also is aroma.

What do you smell?

(breathing heavily) This particu actually has an aroma to it.

And I can pick up on that, almost cucumber like.

(soft piano music) (knives clanking) - Unbelievably fresh.

(soft piano music) Look at how beautiful that is.

So I'm thinking, it's such a beautiful morning ou I want to take advantage of being at this wonderful fishi This trout is amazing and I have so much to work with.

My first course I think I'll do a smoke trout, kind of a classic preparation, nothing too fancy but these guys are so small.

I think I can cure them in time, smoke them, and they'll be just for a starter course.

Lemon and fish are friends, even when smoking fish, lemon adds a lovely nuance to the overall flavor profile.

Just to help the salt and the su Now this goes into the fridge for a few hours.

(soft piano music) - All right.

Let's take a look at our sword f I do love it when a plant has a peculiarity to it, a particular shape to it, that really enables you to positively identify it.

But this one's kind of fun.

Notice how at the base of this little leaflet, there's this little lobe, a litt little lobe if you will.

That points up, right there.

See that, there you go.

That little guy right there, and they all have it.

It's just one way of figuring out which plant you're actually looking at is to that this is a peculiarity of th You don't have it on other ferns or other similar plants, only on this plant.

And that way you see it and you "Okay, I'm very confident.

This is the plant, because look, there's the little lobe, and I don't see that on any othe (soft piano music) (fire crackling) - This variety has me a little p on how to treat it.

I know I have to cook it.

And I know that's essential because I've got to pull out the And the other ones, look at these little lady fern fiddleheads.

They're tender and delicate, the most important thing here, is when I blanch and refresh, can I keep that color?

Sword leaf ferns.

I kind of like what's happening now that the green is being reve I think that's quite beautiful.

The feathers are no big deal.

It's actually quite nice but rather than having a green vegetable flavor, I find these starchy.

I need to try one more thing wit I have to try sautéing them.

(oil sizzling) I like what I'm seeing with thes (pan clanks) (soft piano music) Sautéed for the win.

For the main course, I'd love to make a delicious sau to go with the trout.

And to do that, I need to stock, first some celery, some of my onion bits, and trout bones.

Nothing goes to waste.

I always start my stocks with co And the trick is to bring it to but not to boil it.

I wanna keep it clear and fresh and flavorful.

- [Les] You said you wanted some alder for smoking?

- I did, yeah.

- So you said, dead and damp, that's most of that.

And then I throw in a couple of live ones as well just for the sake of it.

So is that about enough?

- Yeah.

That's tons, that's perfect.

Thank you.

- There's your smoker.

(soft piano music) - Quick pickle on these little l is gonna be really nice with smo (soft piano music) Time for something a little bit I'd say that's perfect.

(plate clanks) (soft piano music) The trout first.

(soft piano music) And then time for this.

A nice bunch of alder.

There we go.

Time to smoke this trout.

(soft piano music) - This beautiful little fern here is lady fern, and this is the choice edible fiddlehead for the West coast.

So over in the East coast it's ostrich fern, here, lady fern.

It's a delicious little fiddlehead, but you wanna be really careful in harvesting them because you can easily kill this plant.

See the thing to remember, about a lot of plants and trees the real life force, the actual plant itself, the living being itself, is mostly under the ground.

We just see the tops of the grou the trees, the flowers, the things come up but actually, what really matters to that livi is what's underneath the ground.

If you're able to look underneath the ground, you would see that the majority of most plants and trees, have much more structure under t than they do above the ground.

What this all means is that the tops of these ferns, these beautiful fronds, that would become quite large throughout the summer, are there to service the rhizome that's underneath the ground through photosynthesis.

It's feeding the rhizome.

So if I come along here, and I pick all of these, fiddleh I'm basically starving the plant to death at that point for the rest of the summer.

It will likely die.

That's why you wanna harvest res So in this case here, there's 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8; 8 fiddleheads, on this one plant right here.

Now some people would say, "Oh, we'll take half."

No, maybe a quarter.

So in this case, two would be ju So I could take one here, here's my one.

And then the second one, lower down, a smaller one.

There's a couple more coming up, and that's it.

That's where I stop with that particular plant.

Now I will move on to another pl and harvest the same way.

So remember that what you're see is not necessarily the most impo of any tree or plant, the brain, the heart, the soul, of these living species of shrubs, vines, flowers, plants, and tree is underneath the ground.

(soft piano music) - Time to check on the trout.

I think these guys are done.

A nice little shine to the outsi I know for the amount of time that I've had them on the smoke, that the flavor penetration will be just about right.

(soft piano music) - And here I am.

Wow!

This looks amazing.

So visually speaking, this is why I love working with you so much.

That's the kind of plating where it's already speaking to m but now it's your turn.

Tell me what we're looking at he - Well, this is kind of a story of our environment.

This dainty presentation is making me think of how delicate those fish were.

Those trout were beautiful.

- Yes, they were.

All right.

- Shall we?

- Yeah, of course I'm ready.

This looks great.

Here we go.

Ready?

- Let's do it.

(soft piano music) - Mmmm, oh my gosh!

Oh Kevin, you're missing out, du Oh, I don't want to talk.

I just want to keep eating.

- Delicate, and bold, all at the same time.

- It's like sweet sour, salty an Oh my gosh!

It's got everything I can't put my finger on just one thought here, because three bites, three explosions of flavor in my mouth What you've got is a wonderful combination of flavors, and textures, and it's that fish is amazing, like it's wonderful.

Oh, this is stellar.

(soft piano music) Yeah, you did it this time.

This one's out of the park.

Rainbow trout at its finest.

(birds chirping) - I've got an idea, for the sword fern to actually u to flavor a dumpling, just a couple of eggs.

(plate clanking) Now, time for some flour, (soft piano music) Okay, now the fun part.

(soft piano music) Just a gentle and soft kneed, nothing too aggressive.

I want these dumplings to be ten (soft piano music) I'm starting with the sauce righ which is a beurre blanc, a classic wine sauce.

I've got butter in my pan, I have shallots in my pan, and I'm sautéing them just enough that they're soft but no caramelization.

And now it's time to put in whit (oil sizzling) crank up the heat, I'll let that reduce.

The trout stock that I made earl should go in now that I've reduced the wine by about half its original volum (soft piano music) We're gonna repeat the first mov (soft piano music) Right now, I'm just cutting down the sword fern.

This is the component that I'm using to garnish them.

So I'll sauté the dumplings, and I'll confetti and coat them, in this wonderful sword fern.

(oil sizzling) So I've got everything hot, ready to go with.

The last thing is for me to cook this fish, inside down, (fish sizzling) always away from you.

So the oil doesn't splash up and (oil sizzling) (soft piano music) All right, thanks for the patien Patience was not required because I knew something that looked like this was going - Wow!

- This dish sort of evolved as I was playing with the ingredients.

I've got these little dumplings which are made of the sword fern but it's caramelized.

The bones from the trout became So that trout was a zero waste d Well, I'm gonna give it a shot for you right here.

(soft piano music) - Fantastic.

Creamy, smooth, almost in the realm of comfort food.

However, I do wanna say though, that the lady fern fiddleheads, I actually liked them best on th - I get it, because they're wond - They're wonderful and I don't this flavor right now.

- Yeah.

I'm loving this.

Sincerely.

I think for me, the learning is phenomenal.

The locations that we're experie all of them have been spectacula Really, for me my culinary journey is about exploration, and that's where I think you and I have a common ground.

- Absolutely.

It's such a gift to forge locall even in a place we've never been If you take the time to learn th and the trees that are all aroun you become familiar with them.

And then when you return sometime in the future, maybe even years later, all of those plants are waiting like old friends, old friends ready to join you on the wild harvest.

This is out of the park, it's knocked out of the park, ma (bright upbeat music) If you'd like to continue the "Wild Harvest" with me, and Chef Paul Rugalski, then please check out our websit @wildharvestfilms.com, where we have recipes and forgin along with deleted scenes and ou from the making of "Les Stroud's Wild Harvest."

- [Narrator] Directly inspired by the series, Chef Paul, and expert forger, "L bring you the wild harvest season two recipe book.

Highlighting all of Paul's dishe and complete with behind the scenes stories.

It is available for 29.99.

In addition, a DVD of this seaso is also available for 19.99.

To order, please go to wildharvestfilms.com, "Wild Harvest TV Show" on Facebo or "Les Stroud's Wild Harvest" o (soft piano music) (birds chirping) - [Narrator] This program made possible by Forest River.

We have always been dedicated to helping people experience the joy of the outdoors, by building a full range of recreational vehicles.

At Forest River, your needs, interest, and lifest are at the forefront of everythi Forest River, "Follow the River.

To learn more, visit ForestRiver (soft piano music)