Title:	The Fruit Forager's Companion: Ferments, Desserts, Main Dishes, and More from Your Neighborhood and Beyond
	Author:	Sara Bir
	Published:	June 5, 2018, Chelsea Green Publishing
	No. of Pages:	400
	Cover Price:	$29.95 Paperback, $20.99 Kindle

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Although foraging for fruit is a nice concept, most of us prefer to gather our fruit at farmer’s markets, grocery stores, or roadside stands. However, for those who want to get into the foraging effort, The Fruit Forager's Companion: Ferments, Desserts, Main Dishes, and More from Your Neighborhood and Beyond by Sara Bir, contains the information to get started. Although foraging isn’t a pastime for those who don’t walk through neighborhoods or places where fruit may be available for the taking, this cookbook contains dozens of mouthwatering recipes that can be used for foraged fruit, or for fruit legitimately purchased.

Gooseberry Fool is a popular dessert in Britain, and Bir’s recipe is as good as you can get in Britain. A favorite recipe from this book is the recipe for Caramel Apple Clafoutis; it is good exactly as written, but having rhubarb around that needed to be used, I added it along with the apples and ended up with a fabulous sweet-tart dessert that will be served over and over. If you find yourself with too many cranberries, you can make her delicious Cranberry Ketchup. The recipe for Italian Plum cake is great, and you can substitute several kinds of fruit for the plums.

Everything in the book isn’t dessert – the Pork Tenderloin with Rosemary Roasted Figs and Onions is suitable for company and is very good. And so is the Raspberry Glazed Salmon. In fact every recipe I have tried so far from this book has turned out picture-perfect. At least I assume mine turned out pretty enough for a picture. There are only a few pictures of the dishes, which is one of the few drawbacks of this cookbook. Nowadays, most of us want to see what we are making before making it. However, the directions are easy to follow and the recipes can easily be made by both beginning and expert cooks. There are recipes using not-so-well-known fruits, so it will give us an excuse to use something new. There is also good information on the fruits used in the recipes.

The Fruit Forager's Companion: Ferments, Desserts, Main Dishes, and More from Your Neighborhood and Beyond may inspire more of us to forage, but it will definitely inspire us to prepare luscious dishes with fruits. This is a fun cookbook to own, and has enough recipes to make a good variety of luscious dishes.

Special thanks to NetGalley for supplying a review copy of this book.