“Only After Leaving Beijing for the Mountains Did I Feel Like a Proper Person”

This episode of Food Talk is a casual conversation held at Jishi, the Beijing Organic Farmers’ Market’s offline store at Sanyuanqiao. We invited two old friends: Kangli and Jin Peng. One is a young Yi woman from Chuxiong, Yunnan, who made her way through school on mushrooms and matsutake (Tricholoma matsutake) from the mountains; the other is a “wild food” practitioner from the Greater Khingan Range in the northeast, who left the city to return to the forests and has sustained himself through mountain foraging for over a decade.

In this episode, the two mountain foragers from the north and the south discuss the real labour behind wild mountain produce, their close relationship with the elderly in their mountain villages, and the agricultural challenges and hopes amid climate change. It may sound like a rather “primitive” way of life, but behind it lie many issues that modern society cannot avoid: trust, income, the labour force, pricing logic, and “what are we really after when we eat.”

This is an honest conversation without any formula, and a collection of stories about “how to make a living off the mountains.”

Welcome to this episode. Come along into their daily mountain life. This is also the first episode in the Beijing Organic Farmers’ Market’s 15th-anniversary series of conversations. More engaging dialogues are coming soon.

This Episode’s Guests

Jin Peng

Currently lives and works in the small forestry town of Huyuan in the Greater Khingan Range. Has collaborated with local mountain foragers for 15 years to harvest wild ingredients. Loves forest life, enjoys going into the mountains to pick all kinds of delicious food, while also observing and documenting this clean northern town.

Kangli

A Yi woman born in 1992. After finishing high school, she participated in rural development work in Kunming and Beijing. At the end of 2015, she decided to put down roots in the countryside for life, so she returned to Chuxiong, Yunnan, to start a business. She has successively launched two platforms, “Kangli Local Goods” and “Happy Homestead,” using sales to support local sustainable foraging and cultural heritage.

This Episode’s Host

Tianle

Convener of the Beijing Organic Farmers’ Market, founding editor of Foodthink.

Timeline

01:05 Memories of meeting: 15 years ago, among the earliest stallholders at the Beijing Organic Farmers’ Market

02:48 Why return to the mountains? Two young returnees’ choices

04:04 What is “mountain foraging”? The origins of matsutake (Tricholoma matsutake), wild mushrooms, and mountain produce

14:26 Do locals also prefer wild mountain produce?

19:09 How to price mountain produce? Not simply following market rates, but ensuring a basic income for mountain foragers

24:51 “This isn’t a windfall” — when customers say you charge too much

27:10 The state of mountain villages: from 100 households to 80 in a Yunnan village, only 2,000 people in a small northeastern town — who is still working?

33:59 Can you feel climate change while mountain foraging?

37:25 Mountains contracted by “bosses”: the dilemma of free foraging

40:15 Back from mountain foraging, only a third of the work is done

56:46 Can you encounter bears while mountain foraging? Wild ≠ easy: the risks, hardships, and protocols of picking in the mountains

61:07 Is the hard work of mountain foraging a declining industry? Inner freedom may be a small reason to keep going

Kangli lives deep in the mountains of Yunnan. The pristine environment is ideal for wild termite mushrooms to grow. The scenery on the mushroom-picking trail is beautiful, with the great range behind and the Jinsha River below.

Jin Peng, who has been mountain foraging in the Greater Khingan Range for 15 years.

The beautiful Greater Khingan Range: rich in resources, far from pollution, with a forest cover of over 80%. Wild-foraged products grow in a natural environment, free from artificial intervention or management.

Various mushrooms, Chinese skullcap, rose flowers, and rosehips drying naturally in the sun.

What mountain foraging brings seems to be more than just natural food from the primeval forest — it carries the scent and energy of the woods, as well as the joy and relaxation that local foragers feel in the course of their work.

Further Reading▼

Thirty Years of Matsutake: A Yi Family Across Three Generations

From the Greater Khingan Range to the Yi Mountains: A Dialogue Between Northern and Southern Foragers | Event Preview

Not Every Mushroom Is a “Junzi” | A Wild Fungi-Foraging Diary in Yunnan’s Markets

A Supply Chain as “Wild” as the Fungi Themselves Is Destroying the Growing Environment of Wild Mushrooms

In Shangri-La, We Climbed the Mountain and Shared Two Meals with Our Lisu Neighbours

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Unless otherwise noted

all images are provided by this episode’s guests

Music: Banong

Production: Xiaojing

Episode Planning: Wen Jing

Episode Editing: Tianle

Contact email: [email protected]

“Only After Leaving Beijing for the Mountains Did I Feel Like a Proper Person” | Food Talk Vol. 51

This Episode’s Guests

This Episode’s Host

Timeline

Published by Foodthink