Japanese Knotweed

Japanese Knotweed is a pest species in the UK. It’s pretty prolific stuff and even the smallest scrap can spread and take over an area very quickly. Therefore, we stick to two points:

Eat the stuff – Anything to hinder it’s growth has to be a good thing.
Always be extremely careful when approaching. Do not tread on it, dispose of all scraps completely. The slightest peel, fibre or speck an spread and it’s actually illegal to do so.

Name: Japanese Knotweed

Location: Anywhere, prolific pest species

Months: March, April (and to a lesser extent throughout the year)

Edible Parts: New stalks or top 10cm of stalks

Non-Edible Parts: Anything else

The stalks of the knotweed are greeny/red in appearance and are hollow thick tubes. You can harvest the top 10 cm of the stalk throughout the year but the best time to harvest is March/April when completely new stalks start to emerge (harvest just like Asparagus).

To eat, peel and cook the stalks like a sweet treat. The flavour is slightly sweeter than rhubarb but has the same flavour. This makes it great in crumbles! Just like rhubarb, you shouldn’t eat it in large amounts so use as a spring time treat only.

Dandelion Flower Cordial

This recipe makes a great light flavoured cordial and makes 1-2 bottles. Enjoyed best over a slice of lemon and ice cubes this is a perfect spring and summer drink. The flavour is very mild and sometimes outweighed by the syrupy nature of the cordial so those who have a sweet tooth may really enjoy this one.

Due to no preservatives or additional ingredients, this cordial has a high sugar content to prevent it from going bad.
Dandelion flowers can be collected around March to April when the sun is in full swing to ensure the flowers are out and full of goodness.

Ingredients

100 Dandelion Flower Heads or more
1kg sugar estimate
half a lemon

Method

Collect at least 100 dandelion flower heads fully opened and trim off the green bases. It’s okay to get a few green bits in with the petals and they usually get in the way.

Give the petals a quick wash/rinse but be careful not to loose all the flavour!

Boil the petals with roughly 1 pint of water and allow to cool and steep overnight in a covered bowl.

Add the juice from a half a lemon and strain out the petals thoroughly.

Weigh the liquid (a bit tricky I know) and for every 1g of liquid you have created add 0.95g of sugar. You can use different sugar types if you prefer but they will affect the flavour, for a clean basic flavour use white granulated.

Stir in the sugar and gently heat until dissolved (do not boil).

Pour contents into bottles and seal.

Dandelion Coffee

This coffee can be made all year round, but to get the best size of dandelion roots harvest them around February & March just before they flower.

Ingredients

Dandelion Roots

Method

Scrub the roots to ensure they are clean from soil.

Dry them or oven roast them at a low temperature until brittle to the touch.

Grind up the roots and store in a clean dry jar.

To enjoy this coffee, boil the powder in a saucepan until the water turns dark brown like espresso and you can smell the “coffee”. Then pour into your cup as per normal instant coffee. The great benefit of this coffee substitute is that not only does it taste almost the same as coffee and have a great robust and smooth savoury flavour but it also has zero caffeine in it. If you are looking to cut back on your caffeine this may be the answer for you.

Chives or Crow Garlic

Name: Chives, Crow Garlic

Location: Rocky areas or roadsides

Months: March, April, May, June, July

Edible Parts: Young Leaves (softer brighter green ones)

Non-Edible Parts: Flowers

It’s amazing what you find out and about on a pathway or woodland path. In this instance I found Chives or Crow Garlic. They are essentially the same thing, long thin tubular leaves that smell and taste of onion/garlic. You can use them fresh as they are or dry them out to use as a herb later.

Nettles

It’s not just goosegrass that’s popping up this spring nice and early. Nettles are growing new shoots in abundance and these new baby leaves are perfect for a variety of household kitchen uses.

The newest youngest nettle leaves can be picked for a variety of meals and treats including nettle tea and nettle pesto. Why pay an obscene amount for a small jar of pesto or a few bags of tea that you can basically get for free from your garden?

Name: Nettles

Location: Anywhere.

Months: March, April

Edible Parts: Young Leaves (softer brighter green ones)

Non-Edible Parts: Tough older leaves (just not very tasty)

Caution: Wear gloves when picking and wilt before eating!

Make sure before you eat any nettles that you properly wilt them first. To do so, place the nettles in boiling hot water and push under the surface then take them out and put them into cold water right away to stop them cooking. This removes the sting and makes them edible.

Wild Garlic Paste

Now that the Wild Garlic is springing up again this season take advantage of it and try to store as much of it as possible to last you until your next garlic harvest.

A simple and easy way to store wild garlic is to create a garlic paste. All you need is some high quality oil such as Olive Oil and a bunch of wild garlic leaves/bulbs. SO long as the wild garlic isn’t flowering, you can use the whole thing for this paste.

Step One: Add a touch of lemon juice, a dash of salt and pour a tablespoon of olive oil to your Wild Garlic. Then, blend them together, a handheld blender works best.

Step Two: Add more love oil if necessary to make a strong garlic paste to the thickness you desire and mix well.

Step Three: Pour into a jar and top with a layer of oil to seal it in and stop air exposure.

You can keep this paste in the pantry or in the fridge, so long as the oil layer is maintained it shouldn’t go bad. You may find in the fridge the oil layer becomes hard, that’s normal! Just scoop underneath it and reseal after use. You should only need a teaspoon per meal to replace your usual garlic cloves as it’s reasonably strong flavoured.

Goose Grass Tea

If you have picked up some goosegrass this spring for eating, save a little to one side for some goosegrass tea.

DIABETICS SHOULD AVOID THIS RECIPE.

Making the tea is very simple! Just dry out the goosegrass at around 50 degrees in your oven or dehydrator. Then collect in an air tight dry and sterile pot.

To brew the tea, simply add a little to your strainer or pot and allow to steep for ten minutes.

This tea makes a great herbal remedy for constipation as it’s a mild laxative.

Goosegrass

It’s spring! and One of the first things to come up this spring that you may not be aware of as being edible is – Goosegrass! You may know it by many names including sticky weed, it’s distinctive due to it’s sticky nature and most people know it from their childhood days of sticking it onto the backs of unknowing parents and siblings.

It’s been a while since our last post, and we haven’t been idle but winter is a hard season. Next year we will be able to tell you more about the various wine, cider and food stuffs we have been collecting in more detail.

Name: Goose Grass, Sticky Weed.

Location: Anywhere, usually poorly drained and compacted soil.

Months: March, April

Edible Parts: Leaves, Seeds

Non-Edible Parts: Burrs

Caution: Diabetics should avoid Goose Grass Teas.

As one of the first edible plants to pop up at the start of the spring season, Goosegrass is a handy herb to know how to use as a part of your diet. Best picked in March in full sunshine, you can take advantage of the young fresh leaves. The leaves can be used like a salad leaf or replacing basil in a pesto. If you use the leaves to make a tisane (Tea) it becomes a powerful diuretic and a mild laxative. The seeds can be used as a coffee substitute although in our humble opinion Dandelion roots make a much more substantial and tasty coffee flavour.
Even the root of this plant is useful as a red dye agent.

Sweet Red Apples

Name: Apples

Location: Apple Trees!

Months: October, November

Edible Parts: All except maybe the stalk

Non-Edible Parts: Stalk? The Tree?

While cycling through one of the many scenic cycle routes in Birmingham I came across a wonderful array of sweet red apple trees. I almost passed it by completely in my speed but the rate they were dropping had quickly created a red blanket in the corner and more were dropping as I looked. After a quick taste test I found these were not the lesser valued crab apples but sweet dessert apples of a most gloriously syrup like nature. I have never tasted a sweeter, crunchier apple in my life. Not a single ounce of powdery taste or bitterness.

There are so many apples there I could not fit them all into my backpack, so return journey’s are on the cards! I always find it truly amazing how many people just walk past these little golden finds and surely a red apple is as obvious a food source as it gets?

Oh well more for us! After picking up as many as I could possibly hold before the last of the daylight condemned me to utter darkness, I took them home and began the therapeutic task of washing and scrubbing the apples clean and sorting them into piles of bruised and undamaged. The undamaged ones are going to be used for eating and the bruised ones will be for cider with any luck.

Puff Ball Mushrooms

Name: Puff Balls

Location: Dead wood

Months: Usually August and September (**Note I found some fresh new ones as late as November this year due to the mild weather!”

Edible Parts: The spongy middle if pure white (Remove skin and do not eat if it is turning yellow or green inside).

Non-Edible Parts: Skin (yucky)

Here’s what these puff balls look like when skinned.l They are spongy, pure white and have a bit of air in them so you can hear it escaping sometimes when you squeeze them.

Some puff balls have spiked skin and some are less wrinkly. All puff balls are edible.

They can be dried for storage just like any other mushroom but go great fried and added to burgers (especially giant puff balls which can make up a steak sized portion in your burger!).