Wild Harvest | Market report

This week's market report from Wild Harvest features white asparagus, wet garlic, fresh morels and baby figs as well as a whole host of other fruit and vegetables currently in season which you can see below: Whilst I’ve enjoyed writing about rare root vegetables and cutting edge citrus for some months, it’s always refreshing to see the early signs of Spring. March rings in the changes before it’s time to put away the puffer jackets and woolly hats.

Wild Mushrooms and Truffles

The mushroom hunting areas of Turkey have emerged from their covering of snow, and we have been offered new season fresh morels for the last two weeks. The season is relatively late this year so abundance is yet to drive prices down. You can only pass these beauties up for so long, and we have lined up our first meaningful shipment for Tuesday’s sales. With their robust (relatively low moisture content for a mushroom), dimpled, sauce catching form the seasonal milestone that is the Turkish morel is likely to be with us until the end of May. Portugal still dominates our fresh wild mushroom offering, with the season showing signs of winding down.

Yellow and grey legged chanterelle - Portugal
Pied de mouton – Portugal
Trompette - USA

Winter truffles from the Perigord region and Italy are still good, with the French season threatening closure any week soon. Spring white truffles showcased in our previous update continue to please.

Fruits

New season gariguette strawberries are being produced in the South of France. We will do what we do each year, and buy a box a week for our staff to test until sugar levels meet our approval. There’s lots of fun to be had with sweet baby figs from South Africa,

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and the season promises to last for another 2-3 weeks. Here’s a staccato list of some other fruits in fine fettle:

English apples
Blood oranges
Lemons from Nice
Kiwiberries
Williams and comice pears
Clementines
Finger limes

Vegetables

We are now enjoying excellent French white asparagus, whilst we sharpen our weapons for the fight for the first English green asparagus due in a couple of weeks. Wild garlic is so close I can smell it. Three cornered wild garlic has proven a great early stand in this year. Wet, new season garlic bulbs have started from Egypt. A more than passable option until the French season starts. The first indoor crops of the mighty Jersey Royal potatoes have been lifted. Prices take a nose dive as it gets warmer and the main outdoor crop reaches our shores. Wet Garlic

We have bided our time for a couple of weeks, but as we are ringing in the changes fresh peas and broad beans are also joining our offering next week. We live with these two lines until September. The origin shifts from Spain to France and then England as the sun moves around the globe. That’s an astronomically unsound statement, but I’m sure you get the gist of it. As above, here are some bullet pointed bad boys gracing our fridges from the vegetable kingdom.

Forced rhubarb from the Yorkshire Triangle
A bevy of fancy adult beets
A vast range of unusual roots which I have been detailing throughout the winter
AOC sand carrots
Foraged alexanders
Romanesco
Sea purslane
Wild cabbage

As usual, this is just a small selection of what we have on offer. Call in on 020 7498 5397 to speak to the team about what other treats we have in store for you today. Visit the website here.