Wild Food: A Complete Guide for Foragers

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In 1975 Phillips began his life’s major work of photographing and publishing pictures of the world’s garden plants. Using modern photographic techniques, he set out to develop an encyclopedic collection of books to show the difference between plants as diverse as mosses, roses and annuals. His first book ‘Wild Flowers of Britain’ was a huge success, selling 400,000 copies in the first year. He wrote more than 30 additional books (often with his co-author Martyn Rix) selling over 4.5 million copies worldwide. He has learned a lot, too, from spending time with a Native American tribe, the Nez Perce, in Idaho, who retain some of the ancient knowledge of hunter-gatherers. Not only did Phillips increase his knowledge of edible tubers, he became friends with an eminently quotable chief: “How long will it take mankind to realise that you cannot eat money?” Called up to do National Service in the RAF, he was sent to Canada but resigned his commission, declaring himself a pacifist, and worked in a hospital, at the same time enrolling in night classes in painting at the Chelsea School of Art, later completing the full-time course. He also served as chairman of the Society for the Protection of London Squares, helping to frustrate the incursions of developers, work for which he was appointed MBE in the 2010 New Year Honours.

Phillips accepts their compliments modestly while polishing off his stew – a dish I feel I could eat every winter lunchtime and never tire of. There is some discussion of the origin of the chanterelles – Portugal at this time of year – and we then wander to the edge of the market to get a glass of wine and sit and talk about the mulchy beginnings of his first love. Phillips was best known as an expert on roses and fungi.He was Honorary Garden Manager at Ecclestone Square in London and in the 2010 New Year's Honours Listwas awarded the MBE for services to London Garden Squares.Note that the book measures 8.5 by 11.5 inches so that the glossy photos are large enough to be easily appreciated. Phillips published books about trees and ferns and wild flowers before he got to mushrooms. He didn’t think the publisher at Pan would go for it. The British, he suggests, had always been funny about fungi. While across Europe and beyond natives would be out in fields and forests as if on pilgrimage in mushroom season, in the UK there was no tradition. “We were famous for herbs from medieval times, of course,” says Phillips. “But those books tend to refer to mushrooms as ‘the spit of Jesus’ or ‘the fruit of the devil’. Because they grew up from nowhere overnight they were associated with witchcraft.” Despite all the changes he has witnessed at first hand as a result of factory farming, he remains an optimist. He believes not only that we may see a necessary revival in sustainability, but that some of the more miraculous properties of fungi in particular might yet help us to fix the damage already done to the planet. “Fungi have been used to break down oil spills,” he says. “I think they will have a role to play in ridding the world of plastic.” Note: The original version of this book (published in 1981) called “Mushrooms and Other Fungi of Great Britain and Europe” was my first proper mushroom book, and remains my favourite. It is still available second hand. It is as good as (and in some ways better than) the 2015 revision that I’m reviewing here, though quite a few of the binomial names it uses are now out of date. The original includes a list of the 25 most common fungi found on British Mycological Society forays, which I think is extremely useful, but it was (sadly) omitted from the revised edition (I’ll blog it some time – and I feature many of its species my Webinar “20 Common, Poisonous, Medicinal and Delicious Mushrooms to Learn Before You Die!” ). The original version was a little less compact. Excellent, clear, full-colour, close-up photographs of mushrooms – often in various stages of growth and from various angles/sections

He was Honorary Garden Manager at Eccleston Square in London and in 2010 was awarded the MBE for services to London Garden Squares. This all means that anyone wanting to honour his memory has a range of choices: he created a real live living garden plus a pile of brilliant books (he also made a wonderful online foraging course for the Idler Academy, and appeared as a guest on A Drink with the Idler in June 2020). Phillips, Roger, and Jacqui Hurst. 1983. Wild food: [a unique photographic guide to finding, cooking and eating wild plants, mushrooms and seaweed]. London: Pan Books. Will not identify your mushroom to species level – you will require an identification guidebook to complete this process (see below) Some of the best fungi identification guidebooks aren’t especially interested in wild food – and some have no information on edibility at all. On the other hand, most fungi guides that are focussed on eating wild mushrooms tend to have limited coverage of very common, but inedible, species. Having only one such guide will result in some very frustrating forays!

Phillips warned against using his guide – or any other – as the sole authority on edible fungi, advising that novices should always have experts identify their finds.