Feral Foods – Wildcrafting Fabulous Weeds
May 17, 2025
Instructor – Erin Vanhee
10 – 4
location Cultus Bay Gardens – Whidbey Island
homemade pie and beverages included
Reclaim the lost art of foraging wild plants for nutritious and delicious meals in this day long field based course exploring native and non native edible plants. Eating wild foods is not new. Indigenous people around the world still thrive using the diversity of wild foods passed down generation to generation. Whidbey Island has over 100 edible plants growing in your backyard, the beach, farms and woodlands. Learning about wild foods is just as much about the plant ID, gathering protocols and harvest techniques as it is the re-igniting of traditional food-ways and story into your daily life and diet.
In this class, you will identify wild greens, flowers, trees and roots that are common on Whidbey and throughout the northwest. We will discuss ways to prepare wild food as condiments, entrees, grains and delicious drinks. We will gather greens and prepare a wild food salad to include in our lunch break and make a wild greens infused salt for each to take home.
Homemade pie and beverages included
Bring your own lunch and water bottle.
Erin Vanhee is a third generation Washingtonian with a strong connection to the wild plants and bio-regional herbs. She is a forest dwelling, rain catching multi-disciplinary healer with thirty plus years following her destiny as herbalist.
Erin’s classes are a reflection of her relationship with the wild and infuse encyclopedic knowledge of plants with a dash of wonder, humor and story.
Erin practices herbal medicine in Skagit County and spends her days crafting herbal remedies from the land and talking to the resident owls. Her website with services and small batch botanicals is www.erinvanhee.com
Testimonial Dorit Zingarelli:
“I feel so enriched by the “Feral Food’ class I took at Cultus Bay Gardens with Erin Vanhee. We picked free and available ‘weeds’ including dock root, nettles and cleavers, that are full of vitamins and minerals and made three easy recipes, that I use daily and continue to tell my friends about. CBG offers so many wonderful classes that are nourishing, creative and inspiring. We are so lucky that Mary Fisher offers these classes!”