Cooking With Wild Edibles From New England In Your Own Home; A Guide To Edible Plants
Dandelion Root
Foraging Is A Family Affair
Every year about this time, we get excited to think of spring right around the corner. We look through the seed catalogs with feverish excitement. We pick out what we'll plant in the gardens.
We also set our minds to foraging for wild foods. It has been a yearly event since my children were young, and one that I still look forward to now that they are grown. I soon hope to be able to share this with my granddaughter. She already has a love of nature, and I hope to deepen that love just a little.
We start in mid to late April with Fiddleheads. One must pick these just as they emerge, otherwise they are poisonous. You can buy them in markets too. Not as much fun as foraging for them, but, if you can't find them, the market does in a pinch. The trick is to find a patch of them the year before. You'll know where they are in spring. They are a delicious side dish to our home grown potatoes and pork.
Moving on into May and June, we pick like Billy goats all the dandelions we can get our hands on. Dandelion buds are delicious boiled with just a tad of salt. Add a touch of onion for just a bit more flavor. Our favorite is dandelion "mushrooms". They aren't true mushrooms, but pop on in your mouth, and you'd not know the difference. Dandelion blossoms are also put into the dandelion syrup we sell at the farmers markets. Always a hit, once they get a taste.
Dandelion root can be roasted and drank as coffee, or added to coffee for an Earthy taste.
July is Staghorn Sumac harvesting time. You can pick these right through until about mid August. For years, this was the beverage of choice at my son's birthday part. Staghorn makes a wonderful lemonade beverage. Add just a touch of ginger ale to make a sparkling lemonade. It was always a big hit at the party. At 29, my son still talks about it.
Each month, through each season brings a new wild food to forage for. If your family likes the outdoors, foraging for wild food is a wonderful family get together. You spend the day, with book in hand foraging, and spend the time at home cooking it up to eat.
I have great memories of this, and I hope you will try it and make memories of your own.
Cooking With Wild Edibles
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Wild Edibles Organic Tea
- Backyard Blues Organic Herbal Loose Tea Blend
A delicious blend of organic herbs right from your own backyard. Most would think of them as weeds, but you'll think differently when you taste this wonderful tea.
Comments
It does take some patience, but it is worth the effort. I started with a book "New England Wild Edibles". It has great pictures in it. I think it is out of print, but maybe you could find it on amazon. Have fun foraging.
I've made dandelion tea, but didn't know you could use the roots to make a coffee. I can't wait to try it! I'm also excited to see that you are working on a book about herbs. There doesn't seem to be too many books about wild foods specific to the New England region. I've been using the book Foraging New England to find wild foods in my own back yard. I think about all of the information that is out there on "superfoods" and herbal supplements that come from other countries and are mass produced, and I wonder just how many super and healing foods grow right in our own back yard!
Paw paws, chestnuts, persimmons, asparagus, Queen Anne's lace, chicory, Jerusalem artichokes, raspberries, huckleberries, wild plums, and whatever else I can get my hands on. Free and delivered to me by God's hand, yum ?
Thanks for sharing.
I like the book "Wild Edible Plants of New England: A Field Guide, Including Poisonous Plants Often Encountered" by Joan Richardson. It is out of print, but you can find it online. It has great actual photographs. It is a great book if you can find it. That is the book my kids and I would use.
There are so many wild foods, I just touched on a few of them. I did a class once at the library, and people were amazed at what was out there. Many wouldn't even try them...lol...their loss.
Very good hub.
Dandelion stems can be squeezed in juicer and make good healthy juice.
The young leaves can also be made into a salad.
Voted up and useful.
True, true. I can't believe I left that out. Thanks for stopping by. Always love to hear from you.
Joe Macho 3 months ago
Over the last couple of years I've been dipping my feet into wild foraging. It's been a blast so far, but it does require some patience and plant basic identification knowledge. I've really only gotten around to finding a few wild herbs and a great patch of wild carrots so far. This year, I plan to gather a bunch of sunchokes though! Pretty exciting. Thanks for sharing such great information.