Wild Foods of Prince Edward Island

Kate MacQuarrie’s Wild Foods of  Prince Edward Island will be released by Acorn Press in June. All are welcome to attend the book launch on June 20 at 5 pm at Beaconsfield’s Carriage House in Charlottetown.

Wild food is everywhere.

PEI is famous for potatoes and seafood, but the forests, meadows, marshes, and shores are home to hundreds of species of edible plants and fungi. Of course, edible and palatable are not the same and award-winning biologist and forager Kate MacQuarrie knows the difference. 

This book highlights 30 of her favourite wild foods, representing all seasons and habitats. She explains how, when, and where to harvest them—and shares some of her personal recipes, too.

Foraging can be elevated from the basic “can I eat this?” to a tool that helps people see plants, fungi, and the world around them in new ways. Each species in this book comes with fascinating, little-known information to pique curiosity. From the luminescent flowers of Evening Primrose to the insect-repelling properties of Pineapple Weed, readers will learn something new, fun, and interesting.

MacQuarrie has been eating wild foods, tracking wild animals, and interpreting the story this land tells about itself for more than 30 years. She holds undergraduate and graduate degrees in biology, has researched PEI’s upland hardwood forests and coastal sand dunes, found plants not previously known to exist on the Island, and published papers in national and international peer-reviewed journals. She also runs PEI Untamed, a business dedicated to helping people reconnect with the natural world. Nearly 1000 people attend her in-person programs annually and thousands more follow her on social media.