Our story

Fermentation and foraging are ancient practices where nature, time and our bodies intertwine. Our aim is to bring wild nature to the table and keep alive the practices that have for centuries shaped how people eat, heal and build community. Through workshops, consulting and experimentation, we give people practical skills to preserve, enrich and make food more nourishing.

Liis Tuulberg
Founder, Metsik Toit

About Liis

Liis Tuulberg is the founder of Metsik Toit and a long-time enthusiast of fermentation and foraging.

Her interest in wild plants and foraging has followed her since childhood — even back then her grandfather broadened her sense of food, when nettle soup and dandelion leaf salad appeared on the table.

After completing a master's degree in social and cultural anthropology, Liis headed to a residency at the Nordic Food Lab in Copenhagen, where her interest in foraging and fermentation grew into a more serious calling.

For the past ten years Liis has dedicated herself to researching and developing wild edible nature, fermentation and food culture. She draws inspiration both from the rich local foraging and fermentation culture and from fermentation practices and techniques from around the world.

Liis always has several experiments running in her larder at once — vegetable ferments, different kinds of misos and kimchis, fermented drinks, craft vinegars and more. The most special, however, is the shelf dedicated to fermented native wild plants and foraged gifts of nature.

Our approach is wild

Metsik Toit ("Wild Food") is a play on words that brings together the three pillars of what we do.

Wild

is our boundless attitude to what can be food. The nature around us is full of the edible — our aim is to inspire people to get to know it, value it and experiment with it. Just as boundless and wild is the world of fermented foods and drinks, where people and microorganisms work hand in hand, creating new sensory experiences together. Here another layer of "wild" emerges: home-fermented foods and drinks are almost always born from microorganisms found wild — yeasts, bacteria and fungi that live in abundance all around us.

Forest

is both a landscape characteristic of Estonia and a cultural archetype — a place to escape to, to reflect and unwind, and our field of work. We forage edible plants from forests, shorelines, bogs, meadows and urban nature, always following the principles of ethical and sustainable foraging. We make sure our foraging spots are clean and untouched by waste. The raw materials we gather are used in our events, workshops and product development projects.

Food

is what we forage from the forest and ferment in our larder, and what eventually makes it to the shared table. For us, food is not merely nutrition, but flavour, memory and a way of sensing place and season.