My researches and goals

During 15 years of culinary and botanical researches throughout Europe, I've been very lucky to meet lots of people in love with nature : farmers, grand-parents, herbalists, botanists, chemists, herbal doctors, naturalists, forest wardens, biologists, cattlemen, and all of them have passed their knowledge on to me, shared their passion with me and now, I do the same, cooking dishes, preparing beverages, with wild or biologically cultivated plants unfortunately forgotten nowadays. I give the recipes and the remedies with plants (flowers, stalks, leaves, roots), which the ancient generations used to prepare before giving them up for several reasons : the drift from the land, the disappearance of the herbalists, the development of a new form of medicine (synthesis), the pollution (pesticides, fertilisers, and chemical products), which resulted in the disappearance of some plants. During my educational activities in infant, primary, secondary, catering, horticultural schools, I noticed that the pupils and even their teachers (which was surprising...) knew very little about wild plants. Whereas I think that a better knowledge of nature and what grows in it would contribute to a better protection of our environment and therefore of our own organism. Nature is everyone's mother, it feeds us and and heals us since the beginning of the world. We are born in its womb, it gives life to us. Let's know it, love it, it needs us so, and if we take it by the hand it will guide us towards a better future.

The plants and our ancestors

In former times our ancestors used to pass on to their sons and grand-sons all their botanical knowledge acquired in the nature, the forests and the rivers. They used to teach the young how to prepare medicine to cure everyday diseases, like herbal teas, cataplasms, wine, spirits (made with mixed plants).

To eat, during the spring, they would pick the very first wild salads, the leaves and roots as the chenopode (wild spinach) (Chenopodium Bonus Henricus), the salsify, the asparagus, the valerian, etc... without omitting the edible mushrooms and the wild fruit. They could preserve the food during the year thanks to several techniques : the salting, the drying, the sweetening, the fat, the alcohol, the soil and later the sterilisation, and the freezing. All generations could fully enjoy the nature that surrounded them, and knew how to prepare wine, syrup, lemonade, spirits, jam, and cosmetic products like care and beauty creams, and dyers. These are the reasons of my work and fight. This popular knowledge must not fall into oblivion ! It's our cultural patrimony. If we do not pass it on to people, the earth itself would be threatened. Knowing nature better, we will protect and preserve it against actual dangers !

When and how gathering the plants ?

First of all do not pick the plants which are protected (protected species), fertilised or unknown plants. Follow the advice of an herbalist or an aromatic and medicinal plant producer.

Gather only the quantity you need for your preparations and don't pull up the roots. Pick sound and fresh plants in dry weather. Wash them several times with vinegar drops to eliminate the wild animals' urine and excrements. Never use plastic bags (risk of decomposition and fermentation of the plant). If you want to dry your plants to preserve them, spread them always in the shade and in the air if possible or in windy dry shelters (attic, barn, shed) and put them on cotton clothes. You can keep dry plants one year but avoid gathering too much.

Glossary : preparation
of different beverages