Foraging in Florida: Easy Edible Plants for Beginner Foragers
Foraging in Florida: Easy Edible Plants for Beginner Foragers
Foraging in Florida: A Beginner’s Guide
Food is growing freely and abundantly all around us in Florida, but many of us walk past this food every day without ever noticing. In this article and video, I share 17 easy plants to help you begin foraging in Florida. Of the hundreds of edible and medicinal plants that grow here, I have chosen the easiest plants to identify, that are widespread and common throughout much of the state. I have also focused on plants that can be harvested in large quantities. Each of these are plants that can change your life!
Plus, I have shared my suggestions on how to prepare these wild foods.
To get to know each plant in more depth, you can click Latin name link, which will take you to an article about foraging the plant (for plants where the link is present).
Transcript: The following is a transcription of Foraging in Florida: Easy Edible Plants for Beginner Foragers.
Food and medicine is growing freely and abundantly all around us here in Florida. Today I am going to introduce you to 17 plants that you can forage that can change your life: fruits, greens, wild yams, a whole variety of foods and medicines that most of us pass up and do not even know. Many of us have seen these before. Today you are going to learn how you can work with them as food and medicine. These are the easiest to identify, most abundant plants that can bring a lot of nourishment into your life.
Loquat
Eriobotrya japonica
This is loquat. It is a common landscaping plant like magnolia. Most people who have this in their front yard do not eat it, and a lot of people do not even know that it is edible. Another name for loquat is Japanese plum. I like to eat these by biting the tip, spitting that out, eating the fruit, and then spitting out the seeds. You can dehydrate or can them as well, but usually it is fresh.
Banana
Musa spp.
This is wild banana, an abundant food to harvest here in Florida. It is not truly wild; it is feral. You will find stands like this along a lot of the roadsides. Bananas reproduce from one single pup that can turn into a whole stand of dozens or even hundreds of bananas. Sometimes in places like this you will get numerous racks. What I like to do with bananas is eat them in many different ways. You can let them ripen and eat them yellow as a fruit. You can boil them and eat them like a potato. I like to dehydrate them with the peel on and then blend that into a flour with the green peel and with the fruit. This is a green banana flour.
When you harvest it, you actually cut the whole plant down. It is not a tree; it is a grass, and the plant only produces once. You pull this whole part down. If you find wild stands like this and you see that there are not plants that have been chopped down and you can tell it is not being maintained, then this is good feral banana harvesting. Happy to have a little score. You might wonder what is going on here. There was a recent freeze, so all of the bananas have died, but they are going to come back up by pups. One plant planting one pup can turn into a whole stand of bananas like this. This is a great plant to guerrilla plant to get more growing.
Coconut
Cocos nucifera
Coconuts grow abundantly here in Florida. If you are looking for a food that helps you to drastically break free from the grocery store, this is absolutely one of them. They grow in public spaces as well as private spaces. This is another one where you can knock on doors and get to know people in your community or find them just growing in public parks and public spaces. There are two different main coconuts you will work with: green coconuts and brown coconuts, plus a whole spectrum in between. Green ones are for drinking coconut water. Brown ones are for a whole lot of different products. With the brown ones, you get mature nuts inside with white meat. With this, I can blend it, turn it into coconut milk, and then use that as a base for a coconut curry. I will dehydrate this and have coconut flakes. You can also make coconut butter and coconut oil. When you blend it and make that coconut milk, the leftover fiber is actually coconut flour that you can then cook with and bake with. It is a very versatile food and one of my absolute key foods for foraging in Florida. One small note: some of the trees are injected with pesticides that are particularly damaging to our bodies more so than some other pesticides. The simple thing to do is only harvest from trees that you know have not been sprayed, which means talking to people and getting that confirmed.
A short lesson on harvesting the brown coconuts, or what I call the brownies. You can harvest these from the trees, but generally I just harvest them once they have fallen. For high quality brownies that have not spoiled yet, first look for a nice sheen or shine that shows they have not been sitting for too long. Look for the umbilical cord with no moisture or rotting. If it is moist or rotting, there is a good chance the nut is bad. When you pick it up, it should have some weight to it, but it will not be heavy like the green nuts. The key is to shake it. That sound means there is a good amount of water inside, which is the coconut water from these brown nuts.
Cucumber Weed
Parietaria spp.
This is a beautiful patch of cucumber weed, also called Parietaria spp. This is a very abundant green growing here in Florida. It is called cucumber weed because it tastes like cucumber, mostly when it is young and tender. When it is older, it starts to get a stronger flavor. What I am looking for with cucumber weed is stems that are somewhat translucent and do not have a lot of fiber; they are very high in water content, similar to a cucumber. You can eat the stem, the leaves, and the seeds. Nice cucumber flavor. I recently discovered that on some of the bigger stems, they actually taste like curry tree leaf, one of the ingredients in curry. This is just another wonderful green that grows here in Florida that people consider a weed but can be eaten in pretty large quantities. Wonderful cucumber weed.
Spanish Needles
Bidens alba
Most people look at a scrappy patch like this and just see weeds, a problem that has to be dealt with. But I look at this and see food. Looking around this patch, almost all of this is food and medicine that is growing. Right in front of me, this is Bidens alba or Spanish needle. This is one of the most common plants in Florida, but only a small percentage of Floridians eat it. It is most known for the seeds that stick to our clothes; that is where the name Spanish needle comes from. This is a cursed plant by many, but for me it is food. I like to pick the tender growth tips, the ones with brighter green that break off easily where they are bendy. I generally cook Bidens alba by sautéing, blanching, or boiling it. You can also make pesto from Bidens alba. You can eat the greens at any time, but when they are young and tender they are more desirable. You can eat the flowers as well. I like to eat them raw as a snack or add them to salads. It has a very unique flavor, the flavor of the sunflower family, which is the family they are part of. It is not a flavor you get from the grocery store for the domesticated palate. This is a plant you will grow to love as you rewild your palate. Stop spraying, stop trying to destroy it. If you find it to be a problem, eat the problem. This plant is not just important for humans for food and medicine. It is also very important for the insects we share this home with. The flowers are considered one of the most important for pollinators in Florida because they are available twelve months of the year, year-round. Herbalists love this plant, too. It has many uses for herbal remedies.
Peppergrass
Lepidium virginicum
This is pepper grass. Some people call this poor man’s pepper, but I like to call it rich man’s pepper. This is a very common weed that grows throughout Florida. You will see it in different stages. Here is the most commonly noticed stage with all the green seeds. Here it is in a younger stage with nice tender leaves and some flowers. I have it in even younger stages here before it has seed or flowers. It is edible at all stages. You can strip off the seeds and use this. Some would call this a pepper substitute, hence the name rich man’s pepper or poor man’s pepper. I like to eat the leaves as well. If I am eating a lot of it, I find the ones that are young and tender and break off the tips where they easily break off, add that to salads, and cook with it as well. It has a wasabi-like kick, so it is on the stronger side; not black pepper, more like wasabi. This is a food that can be harvested in very substantial quantities, another wonderful weed here in Florida.
Wood sorrel
Oxalis spp.
Here I am with wood sorrel or Oxalis. Of all the plants I am sharing, this is one I do not eat in the largest quantity, but it is a really nice one to incorporate into our diet. Basically nobody dislikes the flavor of wood sorrel; it is lemony because of the oxalic acid. This is loved by just about everybody who tries it. I have heard stories of many children who eat this, and it is one of the first or the first plant they forage. They are not even instructed to eat it, so there is an innate knowing that has not been lost in many of us that this is a food and a medicine. What you are looking for is three heart-shaped leaves. If you see three leaves like this that do not have the heart shape, that might be clover. You are looking specifically for three heart-shaped leaves. There are numerous different species; some have really large leaves like this, some have tiny leaves, and they have flower stalks as well. The flowers are also edible and can range in different colors: pink, purple, or yellow, depending on the species. You can eat the flowers, the stems, and the leaves. It is a really joyful one to add to your diet.
Brazilian Pepper
This is Brazilian pepper, and these are peppercorns. They even sell this in some grocery stores. This is a plant considered highly invasive in Florida. One thing you can do if you want to start foraging in Florida but are concerned about doing harm to the ecosystem is eat plants that are considered invasive. There is a term for people who do this: invasivores, like carnivore, locavore, herbivore. An invasivore focuses on eating plants that are considered invasive. When we do this, every single bite is an ecosystem service because we are removing this from the population and its ability to spread. You can also cut these down to help minimize them, but at the very least we can eat them and buy less at the grocery store. Brazilian pepper is most commonly eaten as a seasoning for meat and fish. I like to put this on mullet that I catch here in Florida. If you are expecting black pepper, you will not be happy. But if instead you open your mind and your taste buds up to exactly what this is, millions of people eat Brazilian pepper. It has a fruity, floral flavor with a little spice, and it varies from plant to plant, so if you do not like one, try another.
Smilax
Smilax spp.
This is smilax. A lot of people curse these vines because of the thorns, but this is also a wonderful food and medicine. What we are looking for is in the springtime when there are new growth tips. You can run your finger along these, and when you get to the place where it snaps clean off, that is what you harvest. You can eat the whole stem, the young leaves, and the tendrils. This is often called wild asparagus; it has a very similar flavor to asparagus. You can eat this fresh just like that or cook it. The larger tips tend to have a milder flavor. I have found ones as thick as my pinky and as long as from my fingertip to my bicep, so it is possible to harvest a pretty substantial amount of this food and, rather than buying asparagus at the store, get it sustainably from the land growing right around us.
Dollarweed
Hydrocotyle bonariensis
This blanket here is dollarweed, a very common weed in Florida. A note: weeds are just a human concept; there is no such thing as a weed. All of these plants have their ecosystem service, their benefits, and their place. With dollarweed, one of those places is as wonderful food. It has a unique flavor on the stronger side, so I would generally say mix it into salads or sauté it with other greens. But I find it quite pleasant raw just like that. What you are looking for with dollarweed is the coin shape, hence the name dollar. It is a round leaf with lobes around the edges, and the stem attaches in the center of the leaf. Dollarweed generally grows where there is moisture, so this is a perfect example of an area where moisture would collect. You will find this growing in lawns that get watered a lot and also along the edges of ponds, lakes, and creeks. Dollarweed: just one more wonderful food and medicine growing right here in Florida. Honestly, I cannot get enough.
Citrus
Citrus spp.
This is a very abundant food to harvest here in Florida, with many different varieties. Here is sour orange, which generally people do not like to eat, but they use it for marinating meats, and you can make an orangeade similar to lemonade from these sour oranges. There are also a lot of sweet oranges in Florida. I often find these growing under live oaks, where they tend to be more protected or less susceptible to citrus greening. I have found acres of wild citrus growing under live oaks, including tangerines. Other places you can find wild citrus are old abandoned orchards that are not being used anymore. I have found a lot of really great grapefruits growing in city parks, especially in Orlando. There are also a lot of people who have citrus growing in their yards that they are not eating that is going to waste: another opportunity to talk with your neighbors. Between the oranges, tangerines, grapefruits, and sour orange, there is a lot of opportunity to harvest wild citrus here in Florida.
Mulberry
Morus spp.
This is mulberry planted in a public median by someone who obviously wants to share the fruit and grow community. Although mulberry is not as common as some of the other urban fruit I find, when I do find it, it is a wonderful joy. Some people see these little berries, which can get much bigger, and think it is a blackberry tree, but this is a mulberry tree. They are much sweeter than a blackberry. What I love just as much about mulberry is the leaves are edible, too, and very nutritious. With the leaves, I make a green powder and can carry these greens with me wherever I go. Mulberry is also one of the easiest plants to propagate by cutting, so you can take cuttings from this, take it home, and plant your own mulberries. This is the dwarf everbearing variety which produces much smaller fruits but can produce fruit throughout the year. I am in Jacksonville, very northern Florida, and here with a different mulberry. This is not the dwarf everbearing mulberry generally planted by permaculturists; this is the mulberry you will find growing wildly on its own. I wanted to show this example because you can see the new leaves coming out. All of these leaves are edible. This is generally considered a weed tree, so it is one that can be harvested in abundance. You eat these leaves when they are young and tender. They can get much bigger and still be edible, but these are ideal for making that leaf powder.
Mango
Mangifera indica
If you are looking to harvest an incredible amount of fruit in the city that you can store the abundance for, mango is my number one candidate. You will find mango in empty lots like this in many urban environments, including Fort Myers, Fort Lauderdale, Miami, southern Florida, and parts of central Florida. Besides finding it in empty lots like this that are absolutely free for the picking, you can find a lot of it growing in city parks, also free for the picking, and in people’s front yards where it is hanging over onto the street. I am not talking about stealing; I am talking about leaning. The fruit is falling to the ground and making a mess. I have knocked on many doors. I walk up, knock, and say, “Hello, my name is Robin. I noticed there is a lot of fruit falling to the ground, your mangoes. I was wondering if you are not eating them if I can harvest them.” The answer is almost always “yes,” often an enthusiastic “yes,” because they do not want to see this food going to waste. Mango is great for dehydrating, freezing, making juice, mango vinegar, and different preserves. If you are looking to harvest a lot of fruit in the city, this may be my number one candidate.
Yaupon Holly
Ilex vomitoria
This is yaupon holly. For those of you looking to break free from coffee, this is your plant right here. It is actually the only caffeinated plant that grows naturally in the continental United States. It is a relative of yerba mate, which grows in South America, and that is basically what it is like, the cousin of yerba mate. Nutritionally, it is basically the same as drinking green tea. If you are looking for a buzz you can get naturally while doing no harm to the ecosystem by plugging into the global industrial system of coffee, yaupon holly is the plant for you. It grows natively throughout much of Florida and the Gulf Coast states. You will find this growing in many forests but also as a landscaping plant. This is grown as hedges full of caffeine that is available to you. I have leaves here that I dehydrated. You want to dehydrate the leaves before enjoying them, and a lot of people roast them as well. You can even buy yaupon holly from numerous different companies; the Yaupon Brothers are one here in Florida leading the way to bringing this really wonderful local resource into our markets. Keep an eye out for this in your natural spaces as well as in landscaping and break free from coffee.
Wild Yam
Dioscorea alata
Here we have wild yam, Dioscorea alata, also called the wing yam, but, for me, it is just wild yam. This is one of the most incredible food sources that grows in Florida. The largest one I have ever harvested was 157 pounds. You can work with this like you would potatoes: boil it, fry it, make fries. One thing I like to do is dehydrate it and make yam flour. With this yam flour, I can make tortillas or cookies. Here is a yam bread of sorts I made this morning. You can store this for the long term. These yams, once dug up from the ground, can store for multiple months just like this. They actually self-heal when you cut them; they scab over and heal, so you can keep cutting chunks off. This is one of the best calorie sources of wild foods in the state of Florida. To find it, look for the vines; you will not find the yam without finding the vines growing up the trees. Look for the bulbils. Compared to air potato, which has round, gray, smooth bulbils, these tend to be more elongated, brown, and scaly. If you really want to learn how to identify and find wild yam, Green Deane’s website, eattheweeds.com, is the source you can go to learn everything you need to know. The base for this is Orlando as well as Gainesville. You can use the iNaturalist app to find areas where people have tagged wild yam. This is a wonderful one to get out and harvest. It is considered invasive, so whenever we harvest, we are doing an ecosystem service because we also take those bulbils and get rid of them so they are not continuing to spread.
Elderberry
Sambucus spp.
Here we are with elderberry. In Florida, you will see elderberry growing along many of the highways and roadsides. What you are looking for is this sort of scrappy tree shrub. You really notice a lot of these when they are in bloom. They grow in moist environments, so along the roadsides where there are ditches, watch out for rows and rows of blooming elderberry. Those flowers tell you that if you want the berries, you have to come back in a few months. I have here some dehydrated elderberries. With these, I make tea. You can make elderberry syrup, which is important for preventing a cold or helping to fight it off. You can also use the flowers to make tea, elderberry champagne, or elderflower champagne. You can dip the flowers in batter and fry them, then dip them in elderberry jam. I also want to talk about propagating. You can grow your own trees and help them spread by taking cuttings or planting seeds. With elderberry, all you need to do is take a small cutting of the tree, stick this into the ground, and a large percentage of these cuttings are going to turn into more elderberry trees. One of the ways as a forager that we can live in reciprocity is we can also propagate the trees and help them spread.
Surinam Cherry
Eugenia uniflora
Here we are with Surinam cherry that we have just planted as a community fruit tree. This is one of my favorite fruits to forage here in Florida. You will find this growing as a hedge in many urban environments, but most people do not eat the fruits. A lot of people think they are poisonous, but they are very edible. Some will say delicious, and some will say they do not like it at all. What you are looking for are hedges that are often part of landscaping, but you will also find big scrappy trees. Look for the little red fruits shaped like a pumpkin. There is no other fruit that looks like this here in Florida, so you know you have found it. Surinam cherry is an acquired flavor. A lot of people do not like it. There is the black variety that most everybody likes. The red variety has a unique flavor that really cannot be described except to actually try it for yourself. If you do not like the first tree, do not give up because the flavor varies a lot from tree to tree, and the more you eat it, the more your palate gets adjusted to it. We are elated to have planted this Surinam cherry as part of the One Million Community Fruit Trees initiative. Over the next decade through a very grassroots collaborative effort, we are planting one million fruit and nut trees. The idea is to make foraging a lot more accessible, with a lot more fruit to be eaten in cities all across the country, many of them right here in Florida. If you want to get involved with planting trees, raising trees, and supporting this initiative, you can go to robingreenfield.org/communityfruittrees.
Conclusion: Foraging in Florida!
Well, there you have it, my friends. Seventeen plants that grow right here in Florida freely and abundantly that you can forage to change your life. My encouragement to you: start with just one plant. You do not need to eat all 17 of these plants to start to transform your life. One plant at a time, you can reconnect with the Earth. You can break free from the broken global industrial food system and start to eat in a way that is harmonious with the Earth, with the plants and animals, and with our fellow humans. If you are excited to get started foraging, I recommend also going to my beginner guide for foraging at robingreenfield.org/foraging. Another great way to start is to go out foraging with an instructor. You can go to robingreenfield.org/findaforager to find foragers to learn from near you. My book, Food Freedom, is an incredible resource for all of you here in Florida who are looking to grow abundance and forage the abundance. One plant at a time, we reconnect and we break free.
