Friday, May 17

10E2171: Euell Gibbons


File this under late to the party: I had not heard of Euell Gibbons atall until talking to someone about forager-with-a-blog Rohan Anderson. I missed a post last year from the great Wildwood, and one from Cold Splinters or else I would have been better informed.


Euell became an authority on living off the land (not in a survivalist sense, more nature lover and philosopher), by foraging and collecting stems, tubors, nuts, sap, leaves and berries that can be eaten. Have just started reading his breakthrough book Stalking The Wild Asparagus.  Unlike the Nearings of Good Life fame Gibbons does not insist on eating everything raw - bounty may be cooked or jellied or fried and prepared in various ways.
“We live in a vastly complex society which has been able to provide us with a multitude of material things, and this is good, but people are beginning to suspect we have paid a high spiritual price for our plenty.” -- Euell Gibbons
His Stalking books (Stalking the Blue-Eyed Scallop, Stalking the Healthful Herbs, Stalking the Good Life) were all published after he was already 50 years of age, but he became just as well known for his later Grape Nuts cereal ads as his writing. "Tastes like wild chicory!" "Did you know you can eat a pine cone!".




There used to be a drawing on the old Grape Nuts boxes about how they were made. How overcooked bread was ground up in a coffee grinder, especially in the American West to make "cereal" - Anyone have that image?