Hi, Here in Maryland we're just starting to see some tree leaves and a few blooms. I've tried Adding young Dandylion leaves and cutting the yellow blossom ends off the flowers. Adding them to soups and Stews. They pack more of a Kick in scrambled eggs. So start small and add - even a young plants leaves are a little bitter. A few chopped up violets look good in Home made bread. And New HoneySuckle flowers work well mixed into wok stir fry recipes. And - of course. Squash blossoms -flour, oil and pan fry - make good eating too. Anybody else Eating Weeds or growing flowers they can munch in salads of other recipes? I hate to waste the weed blossums and flower petals. They grow better than anything else. Alan
You and Biita will have fun comparing recipes. She calls Dandelions dinner and a drink. She is a great forager for wild plants for meals.
In the spring I look for Polk Weed,(Polk Salit or Polk Salad)All the same.My son and brother love it.I'm not sure the correct name but my mom cooked pepper dock and sour dock alsp dandilions.I also batter and fry the male blooms from squash.Very good to eat.
I eat the chick weed, drink the dandelion and the birch leaves, add the nasturtium blooms and calendula petals to salads, and that's about it. I'm not very adventurous. Where IS Biita?
Here I am!!! Hi Alan, glad to see you eat what nature gave us for free from out in the wild or just from the back yard. Oh man i can make a full meal and never have to go to the store for anything. I use all the above as mentioned, but also there is siersløk or ramps (wild leeks) wild chives, wild onions, sour grass, caraway, wild dill, wild lettuces, wild berries, acorns from oaks, plus all the other nuts that fall from wooded trees, birch sap, leaves and branches all make different types of drinks down to cleaning supplies. I could go on and on and on with what i forage on a daily basis during nice seasons. Little hint on those dandelion leaves. Use onions or chives of anykind when cooking and it helps take the bitterness out. Also they go good with bacon, kind of like a wilted lettuce recipe. The root in fall if dug up and dried makes a coffee like drink when roasted and boiled. The flowers i make wine out of, and also for cooking. Nettles is also a favorite of mine. Great soup or added to stews. Also makes a great drink that is so nutritous for the body if infused or boiled as a tea. I know i have posted alot of foraged dinner pics and such, but if you want more well, i live in Norway and everything here is taking its time to get on with it. Right now i am working on birch teas, i made enough saft or juice last year so i don't need to make more this year. But go out and cut off about 4-6 in length of new shoots with the leaf buds just starting to show. take your first finger and your thumb and make a circle, thats how many shoots you need. Place in a large jar like a litre or quart jar and fill with boiling water, cap, and let stand for 8 hours. This is a wonderful spring tonic for the body and tastes like wintergreen tea. Add honey or sugar if you like. You can do this over and over again, using the same twigs. After about a week, don't drink the water and let stand and it can be used as a very gentle but thourough cleaner for your home. The great thing is if you have pets or children no one can get poisened by it. Or you can just drink it. lol. Wild berries is another of my passions, but now that i have moved i have to hunt those down now. So good luck to you and happy foraging and eating!!!
Yummy flower recipes The honeysuckle flowers and squash blossoms I've tried in my cooking but the violets not yet. Thanks for sharing this.
And do not forget the Dandelion Flower omelette (I also eat Dandelion flowers the way you described them with scrambled egg omelette). and Dandelion and Beetroot salad. Georgous and healthy. Yummm Oops I almost forgot - Dandelion Wine Actualy a tonic and it is great to flush toxins from the body and clear pollution build-up. THe Dandelion WIne or Tonic is a great diuretic and digestive.
Here is my recipe for Dandelion Wine Boil two cups of flowers in two liters of water with one cup of honey, 10 cloves, 2 star anise and the juice of at least 4 lemons. Allow it to simmer for about 15 minutes with the lid on. Then cool, strain - and then the fun part - If you like you can use the Dandelion Tonic as is - but I make it Dandelion Wine - by adding 1 litre of good wine. Refrigerate and drink one glas per day.
When I was a kid and lived in Colorado a neighbourhood boy showed me that you could take off the flower of blue bells and suck nectar out of them where they met the stem. And I was told, also when I was a kid, that people can eat the clovers without the lines on the leaves. They're kind of bitter.
Between the dandylion omelette and the honeysuckle stir fry, my pesky plants are looking better and better! BTW, when we were kids we used to do that thing Starface described with the bluebells, only with the honeysuckle blossoms.
WEED COOKING - Dandelion Bud Omelet Recipe Hi, Thanks for all the WEED COOKING ideas. We've got Dandelions all over our lawn right now here in Baltimore, MD - so here is a recipe folks in the NorthEast can try - right now. Ingredients List: 6 eggs 1/2 tsp of salt 1/4 cup or 1/2 stick butter 2 Cups Dandelion Buds - stemmed and washed and patted dry on paper towels Black pepper to taste Fresh opened dandelion flowers for garnishing DIRECTIONS: #1 - Beat eggs lightly w/salt (I often skip all condiments - add On Top based on how things taste. Up to you.) #2 - Melt the butter in a 10 inch omelet pan or skillet - medium heat #3 - When foam subsides add dandelion buds and cook until they begin to burst into open flowers. RAISE HEAT to High. #4 - Pour eggs over the flowers and cook omelet - shake pan constantly. As the edges firm up. Lift edges to let the uncooked egg run underneath. #5 - Cook until firm on edges and a bit soft in the center #6 - (Add pepper now.) Or set out condiments on the table. Let each family member do their own thing. Which I've found to be safest! Serve on a platter with the dandelion flowers as decoration or garnish. Thanks, Alan P.S. - Please let me know how this works out for you. It's too COLD here to plant a garden. But the WEEDS are doing fine. The 1st time I tried this recipe I GOOFED. I used the the opened Dandelion flowers instead of the buds. But didn't dry them enough after washing. I got a soupy mess! I found out the HARD way why the Buds make more sense!
Yum, thanks. My neighbor's yard is full of dandelions -- I'm going to try this! I'd better check and make sure she hasn't put any chemicals on... OrganicAlan -- where is Boring? (I live in Anne Arundel Co).
Where is Boring, Maryland? Dear Daisy, Thanks for asking. Boring has it's own post office. And about 11 houses and a fire engine station. It's so hilly and steep we mainly raise: Deer, groundhogs, chipmunks, pheasant, hawks, crows, raccoons, flying squirrels and the other kind, foxes and Eagles and we even have a nest of Buzzards in the middle of our pine tree thicket. Read Br'er Rabbit and you get an idea of where I grew up. We've got 5 kinds of briars and brambles. Some of them more than 20 feet high. It's btwn Reisterstown and Westminster. 60 minutes North west of Baltimore City. I used to bicycle over there from our farm - as a kid. Got caught in a torrential down-pour one time. Had to call and get rescued. Alan P.S. - You comment about chemicals, pesticides and fertilizer is an excellent one. Don't pick any dandelions near the road either. All that car exhaust.
That's a nice part of Maryland, at least that I have seen. We're so crowded here in AACo now... Yesterday my back fence neighbor and I were wondering about other uses for honeysuckle, besides using the blossoms in stir fry. Any ideas?
HoneySuckle Flower Sorbet Dear Daisybeans, Thanks. I've seen recipes for Honeysuckle wine. Honeysuckle Sore Throat Syrup. But I like to EAT WEEDS... I get more satisfaction and get a sort of revenge on them (I dislike scything honeysuckle off fences) by munching them all summer long. So here's my Favorite... ---------------------------- Honeysuckle Sorbet Ingredients: 5 2/3 cups cool water 4 cups honeysuckle blossoms, tightly packed but not smashed. (Four cups of flowers is the least you will need to make Enough Sorbet. To make more, adapt these ingredients as follows: Use 1 2/3 cups water for each cup of flowers for the initial infusion. For the syrup, use 2/3 cup water and 1/2 cup sugar for every cup of flowers.) 2 cups sugar 1 2/3 cups water a Few drops lemon juice Sprinkling of cinnamon DIRECTIONS: (Wash the blossoms in a pan of water.) Then Add different cool pure water to the flowers. Place in a nonreactive container (glass or stainless steel) and let stand overnight. The next day, make syrup by heating sugar and 1 2/3 cups water in a saucepan over low heat until the mixture is clear, then boiling it for a minute or so, until the syrup begins to appear lustrous and slightly thick. Remove from heat and add a few drops of lemon juice to prevent the sugar from recrystalizing. Cool the syrup. Strain the honeysuckle, gently pressing the blossoms so as not to waste any of your efforts. Combine the honeysuckle and the simple syrup and add just the merest sprinkle of ground cinnamon — a hint will enhance the honeysuckle flavor; even a bit more will overpower it. Put the mix in a glass baking dish, let it freeze a little, stir and smash with a fork. Wait another couple of hours and do the same thing until it's almost frozen through, then put it all in a blender so its gets nice and snow-like. It need to be taken out of the freezer a few minutes before you serve it. OR if you have an ice cream freezer, churn it according to the manufacturer's directions. Makes 1 quart. Thanks, Alan P.S. - On my 1st try - I was tempted to shred some of the blossoms. Leave them in the sorbet. But after chewing a honeysuckle flower Raw. I decided to stick with the recipe. TASTE one. You'll see why.
