better than...

Remember this plant that
I finally identified as a
garlic mustard plant? Well...
look out basil, this is our
new favourite pesto maker!
And it's free for the taking,
tons of it. Actually, it's an
invasive weed. The nearby
town of Lincoln has an
annual garlic mustard pull,
collecting hundreds of
trash bags full of the stuff.
But what do they do with it once they've pulled it all? I'm sure some people realize what good culinary potential it has.

Using the upper leaves and the clump of flower buds before they'd bloomed, I whipped up this pesto that got raves from my husband...

Garlic Mustard Pesto

1 cup garlic mustard
1/2 cup walnuts
3 cloves garlic
1/4 tsp. kosher salt
1 T. vegan parmesan
(optional)
1/4 cup olive oil

Wash the garlic mustard.
Drain and place in a food
processor with remaining
ingredients, adding the olive
oil last as it purees.

I serve it with chopped
tomato over whole grain pasta. It's also great with fresh bread.

Garlic mustard is ridiculously easy to find, but my favourite mushrooms are not. In fact I have not found them since moving to this area. I was super excited to find a log full of them last week, but of course I only had my camera phone and I don't have those pics to show yet. But I got some pics while prepping them at home that evening...

Here they are, washed and
trimmed, ready to be sliced
and then cooked. They are
commonly known as "chicken
mushrooms" or "sulphur
mushrooms" or even "chicken
of the woods". Laetiporus is
an easy to identify edible
shelf mushroom, often found on rotting oak trees growing in large shelf-like clumps or "brackets". This was a very fresh batch, as it had just stopped raining for 2-3 days the day before, and it was a nice warm humid spring day. I picked about what I knew we could eat right away, but I have frozen the raw mushrooms in the past with good results.

Here's how I prepared them...great for eating with a dollop of sour creme and/or avocado, or using as a fajita filling.

Shelf Mushroom Saute

2 T. olive oil
1 large onion, quartered
and sliced
4 cloves garlic, chopped
2 bell peppers, sliced
pinch of cayenne pepper
pinch of salt
2-3 cups sliced mushrooms
1 tsp. lime juice
1 T. chopped cilantro

In a large non-stick pan, heat olive oil over medium heat. Add onions, saute for a few minutes until they begin to soften, stirring often. Add garlic, saute for another couple of minutes. Add bell peppers, cayenne, salt, & mushrooms. When mushrooms are cooked through (about 5 minutes), add lime juice. Remove from heat, stir in cilantro, serve.

If I were a beaver

The rest of vacation week had its ups and downs with wild edibles.












Half the pizzas on pizza
night received chopped
chickweed and it was
fantastic! My new fave
combo is tomato, onion,
garlic, chickweed...with
sauce and Daiya shreds of course, atop my homemade crusts.

Dandelion greens made it
into (and on top of) grilled
nutritional yeast cheeze
sandwiches.

However, the next day I
picked from a new patch
and sauteed them...not even
I could choke them down they
were soooo bitter!

On to what I thought would be a fabulous dessert...here's Ryan after he helped lop off a dozen stems of japanese knotweed.





















My goal was a knotweed crumble, so I did what I would mostly do for a rhubarb walnut crumble or the like. The boys helped, it smelled and looked fabulous. But as my husband said, it tasted great! Except for the splinters!! Maybe it wasn't QUITE that bad, but yeah, the thicker stems were horrendously stringy and pithy.
But can that be solved? I don't know, and the advice I've read is quite conflicted on the matter. For instance, The 3 Foragers recommend small young tender shoots...which makes sense to me because they'd be less stringy...but I did pick a few smaller shoots and I'll be darned if I could peel them before they'd either fray or I'd cut right through to the hollow core! The New England Wildflower Society (who runs among others the Garden In The Woods just around the corner from us) recommends picking the largest thickest shoots possible for easier peeling! They had quite a few recipes available online here.
I am willing to give it another go, but I'm not sure which is more prudent, though I'm leaning towards the smaller shoots and maybe they don't really need peeling?? Hmmm... Just so long as another beautiful looking dessert doesn't end up in the compost I'd be happy.

Another thing that DID go
over well, thankfully, were
dandelion tempura! The
boys of course loved picking
lots of dandelions. After a
quick bath and a patting dry,
they were ready for a simple
tempura batter and pan
frying in peanut oil.

I absolutely love these, and
will happily make them again.

As the spring season progress-
es, I'll be on the lookout for
more wild edibles to try. The
boys never tire of going out
and foraging our own food!

foraging

I love to look for wild edibles...but I need to increase my knowledge so I have more variety! Our CSA offered a fabulous walk & talk with a visiting expert on the subject 2 summers ago, but of course I had to go and have a baby and miss the whole thing. Bother!
Recently I have been enjoying blogs like The 3 Foragers. They are also from New England, so what they find is similar to what is in my local area.
So this week during school vacation I will focus on what spring has to offer here in the way of FREE food!

I began in our yard, right next to the house...





















The top 2 pics are chickweed, very easy to identify once you know how. I have no idea what the bottom left plant is called, but I have been picking and eating it for literally as long as I can remember; I used to call it "sour grass" as a kid as it is very sour, reminscient of SweetTarts candy to me! Does anyone out there know its name?? Bottom right is obviously dandelions. All of the plant can be used, but I started with just the greens, best when young without a thick rib down the middle.

Not quite as wild, but often overlooked...

Rhubarb doesn't need
any attention to do its
thing. Just let it grow
and pick when the stems
are pink/red. Though it's
a vegetable, rhubarb is
usually treated like a
fruit and used in desserts.
It is also quite tart and
needs sweetening. Just
remember that only the
stems are edible.

There are many varieties
of violets, but the delicate
ones growing in yards and
roadsides and in forests are
easy to identify and pick. The little flowers add some nice
color to salad, and can make a lovely embellishment for desserts!

Now maybe there are some of you out there more expert than me on the subject. I've got a few books on my Amazon wishlist, but have yet to purchase anything.





















I've heard that some varieties of sedum (top left) are quite tasty, albeit peppery. And what is this groundcover on the right? Or how about the lower left that carpets the forests in the area? Or the weed on the lower right that is EVERYWHERE around these parts? Even if they're not edible, I'm surrounded by them and would love to know the names of some of these plants.

After washing the greens
in a big bowl of water, I
stuffed them all into the
food processor with a bit
of salt and chopped them
up. Then added the rest of
my usual tofu quiche
ingredients.

I cooked up some onion
and bac-un strips and
mixed everything together.
Normally I probably use
about 1 cup of greens, but
I had at least 2 cups of
packed greens and I used
them all.

The result was VERY green,
and a bit strong, but Nate &
I loved it. The only person
who didn't finish his was
Ryan. I served it alongside
some potato & carrot home-
fries, with a touch of ketchup.