The Scottish Wild Food Festival is part of the trans-national Wild Wonders project funded by Forth Valley and Lomond LEADER in partnership with LEADER in Finland, Latvia and Lithuania. The participants involved in the project visit each other’s countries to share learnings.
Lauren Lochrie, founder of Herbal Homestead is part of the project and visited Finland this year to learn from business models and the countries own wild food festival. Below is Lauren shares her experience with us.
August 2019:
Cow camp turned out to be quite magical for me.
I was caught off guard when I realised how much enjoyment I was having through such a hands-on experience.
Set in a forested and gently farmed location, we were greeted by this short, smiling lady. Her cheeks flushed a naturally weathered pink, and piercing eyes met my attention; but it was her hands. Her strong, working hands that for me, conveyed her whole life.
A beautiful life where a large cow portrait hangs on an interior room wall, as would a relative’s. Of course, this was a relative – the grandmother of most of the herd at cow camp – yet evidently, a dear being in this unusual lady’s life.
Cow camp did seem to be just that – a camp for cows; lots of freedom to roam around the wilds, in a caring and educational setting. These bovine beauties even ‘cat-walked’ their way in procession to their own milking pens. Blinking, long eyelashes greeted us farming recruits on either side as they nodded forward, lashes any model would envy!
Being a housing-scheme gal from the city, I had never milked a cow, even after studying zoology and working in environmental jobs as an adult. Now was my chance!
I remembered not to push Ruth’s son Daniel out the way and waited my turn… the inner child was awakening!
Squatting on a tiny, wooden stool, I managed not to fall over and positioned the metal bucket between my legs as I had seen others do. I recalled again, those wonderful hands of our local Finnish friend, working the milk with ease, into the collection bucket.
My turn. I felt to gently rub the rotuned-ruminance in front of my face, reassuring the warm and gentle creature that stood patiently before me – almost excusing my crude milking-manipulation that was most likely to come!
Squeezing, “harder than you think”, I alternated teats and immediately, milk squirted out… right on my leg! Realigning my bucket and aim I then managed to collect some, phew.
Continuing, I naturally put my forehead against this gentle girl and thanked her. I stopped after a short while as I felt I didn’t want to bother her any more… my eyes aglow, and heart smiling, I communicated this to our dear farmer.
I still don’t know her name, we connected beyond convention or language, and I’ll never forget her.
Echoing this human connection further, I also met other inspiring people in Finland. People who had their own land and knew it well. The locations of special old trees, gullies, and anthills were pointed out and spoken about like old friends.
I enjoyed hanging back from the group as we wandered through the lush forest. I kneeled on a spongey, mossy tuft and admiring our group in front of me, took a picture.
Glancing down, I briefly got lost in the microcosm of life underfoot; creeping berry bushes, lichens, mosses, liverworts, ferns, grasses and more. As I turned my head, voluptuous mushroom caps caught the dappled light of the glade, and my eye as they stood proud above this dense, damp world.
Most definitely, this was a magical place, a meeting place of the wee folk! Beautiful I thought, as I quickly switched back to human size perception so to catch up with the group.
Encouragingly, I met a fantastic young woman doing something very similar to me at the Finnish Wild Food Festival. Marie had a beautifully presented stall. Herbal teas that could aid many an ailment, lay finely packaged and on show, scented, homemade soap sat huddled in their hessian, draw-string bags. Baskets of sweets and glass tea dispensers pulled you in to delight in the free samples.
She was another that seemed to pierce my personal space with her gaze. Yet, her eyes softened as we conversed and related about natural remedies and herbaceous interests.
As this enthusiastic being reached out to hand me her business card, I could see a version of myself.
The Finnish Wild Food Festival was also a positive revelation to me in a way I didn’t expect. Much more food-stall related than I imagined; I was even more drawn then to a colourful, and acceptably busy table that stood at the end of a row of ‘shop fronts’…
There were wild plants in buckets, information boards, smiley faced stall holders, and crates of labelled mushrooms… all carefully positioned on a bed of verdant moss. Cool! I thought, as I found myself heading straight towards it.
I realised that this very simple, yet vibrant and ‘more alive’ stall (in more ways than one), was ‘enough’.
In fact, it was my favourite of them all.
I realised, that if I were to set up my own ‘business front’, it wouldn’t be far off this one. Its rawness and authenticity spoke for itself. I realised that pull-up-banners and business ‘PR’ had its place but didn’t quite ‘sing’ in the same way.
Maybe I could stop worrying about all the ‘official’ bits of kit I didn’t yet have and enjoy this journey. Enjoy these moments with wonderful people so to better engage in this wild exploration of a different culture, and of a different me in the making!
The Scottish Wild Food Festival returns on 9th May 2020. The festival is part of Foraging Fortnight which returns 2nd – 17th May in Fife, Forth Valley & Lomond, Moray and Lanarkshire. The Orkney line up will take place from 29th August – 13th September 2020.