Stalking the Wild Greenback

During the more than 30 years spent eating my way through the meadows and backwoods of America, I have learned a great deal about the health-giving qualities of natural foods and the importance of a balanced diet. It has been a rewarding life--not so rewarding, perhaps, as the life of a stockbroker or a vice-squad detective, but at least my pulse, respiration and blood pressure are all normal and I haven't had to pick up a check or tip a waitress since the Roosevelt Administration. The fact is, there is scarcely a disease known to society that cannot be either avoided or cured by a proper diet. Proper eating habits are the most important factor in man's health. The American Indians knew this, which is why they avoided sweets, starches, junk foods and any packaged foods containing a prize (the quality of a product should speak for itself). The diet of the average Indian was remarkably simple usually consisting of (continued on page 170)The Wild Greenback(continued from page 131) pemmican, buffalo or ferret meat, berries du jour and a piece of flavored leather, which he could suck for quick energy. This unusually Spartan diet has led the famous anthropologist Niles Mull to theorize that the American Indians are descendants of the inhabitants of ancient Sparta who came to America by sea to escape the influx of greasy foods from Bulgaria. In any event, the point is that the Indian was a sensible and prudent eater--if only because delicatessens were so few and far between on the Great Plains.

Unfortunately, modern man does not live in close harmony with nature, as the Indians did, and the effects of the devita-minized and adulterated foods he eats are disastrous. I have spent considerable time in cities during the past two years (on promotional tours for my last book, A Farewell to Gravy) and can personally testify to the general ill health of most city dwellers. Stand on a busy street corner in any city, watch the passers-by, and you will soon notice that 90 percent of them have the disheveled appearance of shell-shocked infantrymen and wobble from side to side like penguins. This condition is the result of vitamin and mineral deficiency, which is known to claim as many victims annually as the new television season.

Since our health depends on what we put into our bodies (and what we wear, too, in certain neighborhoods), we should be extremely conscious of the nutritive value of what we eat. But how can the layman determine which foods are good for him and which are unhealthful? Certainly not by counting calories, which are much too small to be kept track of easily, especially without the assistance of a microscope, a pointer and a pocket computer. To my knowledge, a simple fundamental rule is adequate to determine which foods are acceptable from a health standpoint: Never eat anything that looks more appetizing than compost. Another way of gauging the value of food is by noting its color. Almost all green and yellow foods are good for you, with the notable exception of bell peppers, peach cobbler, unpeeled bananas and cheesecloth. White foods are invariably health-destroying--particularly white bread, which does, however, make excellent packing material. As for pink and red foods, I do not intend even to discuss them, since most of them are aphrodisiacal and do not deserve to be put into anyone's hand, let alone into his mouth or stomach.

To a person raised on the kind of food popular in our society today, healthy eating may seem like an altogether unsavory prospect--but nothing could be further from the truth. Of course, as with other kinds of food, it must be acknowledged that wild foods will appeal to various people in varying degrees. There are many wild foods that I don't like at all; for example, the Luther Burbank memorial muskpeach (which, when ripe, has the texture of modeling clay and tastes like a cross between smoked pork chops and a hitchhiker's sleeve--but which many food experts claim is delicious when boiled and buttered or chicken-fried) and Melanesian stuccoconuts (which usually can be reduced to edible fragments only by gunfire or demolition). It should go without saying that the goodness of any natural food is not so innate as to be independent of personal taste, which is a very individual factor. The Apache Indians used to subsist more or less exclusively on a diet of fungi, nettle-and-sweatweed soup and snakeloaf--but today's average urban American would never be able to observe so strict a diet without complaining to his psychiatrist.

As for the advantages of learning to live off the land, it must be said that foraging for your food instead of shopping for it is inexpensive (except in those areas where landowners are beginning to price-stamp mushrooms, nuts, vegetables and the like), enjoyable and exciting (as anyone who has ever had a beaver violate his leg can tell you).

One of the questions people ask me most often is, "Isn't a diet without meat boring?" For some reason--probably the fact that my name is usually mentioned in association with one kind of wild plant or other--many people think of me as a vegetarian. Which is far from true. I was brought up in a family that ate a broad variety of meats. Opossum, raccoon, mule frog, porcupine, grebe, ferret, shote, quail, woodchuck and muskrat were all found on our table--probably because my mother seldom removed the dishes until hours after a meal was over. I've never understood the prejudice against wild meat. Mulled fetlock was a big favorite with us, as was something called coon d'etat (fresh raccoon stuffed with frangipani and fatback and flayed with hickory scantlings). And frogs' legs as well as chicken feet (a much-neglected part of the bird) were extremely popular, particularly the latter, which, in addition to being a distinct taste treat, were also perfect for extending from a sleeve with a partially withdrawn hand when introduced to strangers.

When meat is eaten sparingly, it is a valuable and important part of any diet, an excellent source of protein, carbohy drates, Vitamin B, anthrax and gristle. It is the manufactured sauces people put on meat that deserve criticism. Sauces were originally worn by the Irish, rather than eaten, but today the habit of eating sauces on food is widespread. Natural sauces can be found inside culverts, where they collect in small pockets during the summer months, and they look just as good on a necktie or shirt front as the manufactured kind.

Of all the foods man commonly uses, white sugar is probably the most harmful. White sugar is popular because it is a sexual stimulant. A recent study conducted in collaboration by the anthropology and home-economics departments of General Beadle State College in South Dakota showed conclusively that 97 percent of the men convicted of rape and/or sex crimes were known white-sugar users, some of whom even carried little packets of restaurant sugar with them in their wallets. It should go without saying that white sugar should never be eaten, and it is no fun to walk on, either. A first-rate sugar substitute can be made by mixing zinc granules with honey, wintergreen, sweet balm and marshmallow root--but, unfortunately, it won't leave the spoon.

Honey is the most popular substitute for white sugar. When I was a boy, my mother used to bottle honey, and some of my most pleasant childhood memories are those of slipping a piece of fresh honeycomb into the pants of people who suggested that members of my family be required to register their appetites with the Pure Food and Drug Administration. At an early age, I came to know the bee, which could be recognized by its distinctive wings and buzzing sound (which birds never made). All my life I have been fascinated by wild bees and intrigued by their honey. My grandfather kept a hive and was well known throughout the county as an expert beeman. One of my cousins, Fredna, was equally well known as an expert B-girl--until her parents found out and sent her away to a school for girls in New England. I learned a great deal about bee hunting and honey gathering from my grandfather and I suspect that he would still be hard at it today if it hadn't been for a lepidopterist who, mistaking the old gentleman's bow tie for a yellow-barred heliconian at a Kiwanis picnic, fatally injured him with several swipes of a butterfly net. Grandfather lived for six months after the accident but spent most of that time in treetops, humming and trying to pollinate apple blossoms.

One of the things I'm told most often by city people who show an interest in learning more about natural foods is that they can't really do so in the city, that city living is just not compatible with such an interest. That sounds like a valid argument, but it simply is not the case, as any moderately enterprising stalker can tell you. There are almost as many kinds of edible flora and fauna in the city as there are in the country, and learning to identify them is merely a matter of practice, whether one lives in east Oakland or in the Everglades. Pigeons, sparrows and swallows are all familiar urban birds that, properly prepared, make delicious eating, despite the fact that they spend most of their time hiding in drainage pipes these days as a result of the excess of hydrocarbons in the air. Most urban reservoirs and sewage plants contain large numbers of flivver, tiny scavenger fish that look like Chinese noodles and taste something like bedsores (though their gamy flavor can be eliminated if they are soaked in a bowl of vinegar for two weeks before and two weeks after cooking). Empty lots, especially those in skid row or ghetto areas, are often a rich source of both water cress (nasturtium officinale) and wine cress (vino officinale)--a related plant whose dusky, smoky berries are similar in taste to the sweetish residue at the bottom of an empty muscatel bottle and which can be used to make a soup potent enough to tan leather. And, like their cactus cousins in the desert, fire hydrants can be bitten at the base of the stalk to provide an excellent emergency supply of water, while chewing the fleshy part does wonders for the teeth. Of the many edible varieties, I find that the Cleveland Casting Works fire hydrant has a wholesome flavor that reminds me of the taste of wild hickory nuts. Then there are the used-car lots and parking lots of the city, which provide the patient forager with a cornucopia of unusual edibles: The upholstery in some automobiles is made from animalskins and can be chopped, boiled and safely eaten by anyone who does not mind a slight paralysis of the internal organs for a day or so; the insulation materials are made largely from sugar-cane products and are at least as tasty as many imported candies after several months in the box; some of the floor mats in late-model cars have a flavor (when braised) that is reminiscent of slightly underdone crayfish; and the vintage V8 engine (like the juice) is a good source of iron as well as several other exotic ingredients that help build strong bones and cause one to walk with a peculiar twitching gait.

Learning to live off the land, then, is a matter of initiative and practice. The same thing applies to learning about the healing qualities of wild plants and herbs. The art of herbal healing is one of the oldest in Christendom, predating even such primitive curative techniques as magical incantations and putting crumbs in the patient's bed. Historical records show that most primitive peoples frequently used hemlock, fennel, senna, sassafloss, hart moss, leper's nape, mandrake, colombo, mannix and a variety of common herbs in treating a whole spectrum of maladies, ranging from wind burn to falling hair. What most people don't realize is that most of these remedies are still effective. Coriander can be used for headaches, tunnel vision, midnight fits and most diseases of the left ear. Calamus can be used to treat horse bite, glove rash, venereal acne and receding shorts. Burdock is good for mutton breath and dizziness in alcoves. And caraway is useful in the treatment of symptoms of lead poisoning, although it is extremely difficult to pick all those little seeds off the buns.

There are more than 5678 herbs, flowers, roots, barks and leaves on nature's table, so it is impossible for me to go into any detail here about the specific properties and effects of each. My advice to you, therefore, is to douse yourself with Raid, get out into the woods and do your own sampling, starting with aloes and finishing with zinnia (if she will consent to go along). Then, if you still feel that you could use Blue Cross, consult the Yellow Pages.