A forager spends just £20-a-week on shop-bought food and makes a fully foraged Christmas dinner - of wild mushrooms, herbs and sloe gin.
Megan Howlett, 26, grew up foraging for blackberries and cockles with her grandparents before she became “obsessed” with finding edible wild plants.
She taught herself about edible plants and mushrooms and now has a diet of 50% foraged foods.
Megan spends an average of £20-a-week on her food shops – buying from local greengrocers and shops.
And she makes a foraged Christmas meal for herself and her husband, Tim, 30, who works in clinical trials, using up food collected throughout the year.
They eat a wild mushroom pastry, roasted root vegetables and sloe gin.
Megan, a full-time forager, living in Midhurst, West Sussex, said: “In foraging you can never be selfish – it’s a mindful practice.
“We’re a part of the circle of life.
“At Yule [a winter festival over the Christmas period], it is tradition to just use what you have collected over the year.
“We make mushroom pastry and roasted root vegetables. Being immersed in nature - you can’t not be happy.”
Megan found a love for nature and the “luscious woodlands” after moving to the South Downs in 2018.
She said: “I started noticing the world around me. I became obsessed with learning about nature.
“You can find rare mushrooms here.”
Megan taught herself to correctly identify wild mushrooms and plants and has now made it a passion and a career – quitting her marketing job in June 2023 to launch her business teaching foraging.
Megan, who eats a vegan diet, now spends her days outside looking for seasonal wild edible plants.
She said: “I pick a spot and wander – then think about what I’m cooking based on what I find.
“I go out every day – and choose a different spot.
“I have a rule of never taking more than 10 per cent of what I find to not decimate the area.”
Megan will go to beaches looking for seaweeds such as kelp, which she uses in her skin care, and sea moss – which she uses as an alternative to gelatine.
In forests, she finds mushrooms such as chanterelles in the summer and porcini mushrooms and berries in the autumn.
She will have 100 per cent foraged foods when she is able to but often adds what she has collected to her meals.
She said: “We have meals that are fully foraged.
“Usually it is an addition to what we usually buy.
“I have shelves and shelves of dried herbs and mushrooms.
“I make our own wine, beer and cider.”
Megan makes a variety of different natural dinners from what she finds – such as wild mushroom ravioli.
She makes fresh pasta from ground chestnut flour and fills the ravioli with mushrooms she finds.
She also makes mushroom tacos, dumplings, wild pesto’s from herbs and garlic, and teas made from elderberries and blackberries.
Megan said: “I’ve always enjoyed cooking and experimenting with it.
“I love making elderflower fizz – it’s alcoholic because of the wild yeast elderflower contains. It’s lovely in the summer evenings.
“In winter I make warmer drinks – acorns are a great hot chocolate alternative.”
She make a conscious effort to make sure what she eats has “no food miles” and buys locally grown vegetables.
Megan has been cooking a foraged Christmas meal for the last four years – which she enjoys with Tim on the first day of Yule.
Tim is “supportive” of her foraging passion.
She said: "He’s good at spotting mushrooms but not at IDing them. He’s a fantastic cook.”
Megan hopes to encourage others to get out in nature and forage safely by following guidelines.
She said: “I find so much peace in foraging. It’s fantastic. I really get to tune into nature.”
