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applestar
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Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

Wild Forage — do you eat weeds?

Spring is start of wild forage season. It’s important that you IDENTIFY the target “weeds” accurately and harvest them from pesticide and herbicide, etc. toxin-free location.

Does anyone else eat what are normally considered weeds? Does anyone else cultivate and grow …or allow to grow… some of the edible weeds in your garden or property where you have some control over their growing conditions?

I prefer to harvest from my own (postage stamp sized) property. In my garden, I have growing and do harvest — dandelions, sweet violets, wild strawberries, stinging nettles….

I have intentionally planted and regularly harvest and eat Japanese ginger myoga, elderberries, persimmon, mulberries, blackberries (cultivated thornless variety), American hazelnuts, Ostrich fern
OSTRICH FERN — First harvest 2022
OSTRICH FERN — First harvest 2022

…and also Trifoliate Orange ‘Flying Dragon’ and figs, …waiting for my pawpaw trees to reach fruit bearing age… and the red fruits/seeds from my very prolific Purple Passion asparagus are being spread around by birds all over the property, so I am starting to harvest “returned-to-wild” asparagus….

…Some that I have tried but have not developed particular fondness for, or only eat occasionally mostly as salad garnish, etc. are chickweed (I do use chickweed to make salves), purslane, lambs quarters, sheep sorrel, wood sorrel, henbit, garlic mustard, greenbriar….

…Other “edible weeds” that grow in my garden but I haven’t tried (had the courage to try) substantially yet are pokeweed, turkey tail mushroom….

This year, I’m hoping to harvest Eastern Redbud blossoms for making jelly, and (if not too late) ornamental cherry blossoms for preserving in salt….


Today, I learned you can eat Japanese knotweed — that DREADED invasive weed. Here is a video of a japanese chef harvesting and preparing spring shoots of Japanese knotweed (1) pickled in apple cider vinegar brine, (2) marinated in ginger soy sauce (3) stir fried (4) cooked into mixed rice (5) jam (contains oxalis acid; said similar in flavor to rhubarb jam — he added green apples, but maybe good mixed with strawberries?). :D

…unfortunately I don’t have any in my garden, and am not likely to be able to obtain some to grow, but I thought I’d mention it in case anyone has access. :wink:

https://youtu.be/lwMtRzaLHIo

pepperhead212
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Location: Woodbury NJ Zone 7a/7b

Epazote is a Mexican herb that often grows as a weed around here. I used to see it all the time when I delivered mail, often growing in the cracks of sidewalks! I used to get some I would see and root it. Now I have the red epazote, which is actually sort of ornamental, and I grow that in hydroponics, in the off season. I will soon be rooting some cuttings of that. And something I have growing as a weed now, because I took it out of my herb bed, since it wanted to take over, is the garlic chives. I planted them behind the shed and composter, and have at least a dozen large clusters of them growing out there already. I use huge numbers of those, once they start producing. The flowers attract bees, like regular chives, but flower later, with white flowers.

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digitS'
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The Weed Category is a broad one and can be made even broader by vegetables and ornamentals that will volunteer as self-sown plants in our gardens.

I won't go into the weeds that I have tried and not really liked but I have always liked redroot pigweed amaranth and lambs quarters.

Now for the volunteers ;).

Amaranth seed was given to us by a friend who was enjoying eating the greens from her garden. It is originally almost certainly an ornamental variety. Quite pretty. We have to keep it under control because a single plant self-seeds vigorously. However, it's quite tasty :wink: .

Orach is a relative of lambs quarters. They are both relatives of spinach. I prefer orach over either. I planted a little seed years ago and it reseeded again and again in one of my gardens. Unfortunately, I no longer have that garden and have tried a couple of packets from seed sources that were not quite the same - still looking. One great advantage with orach is that it is very early. Volunteers were there when we first showed up in the Spring and were among our very first salad greens!

As a pair, orach and amaranth make a good combination. Orach is very early. Amaranth can take some Summer heat. Both can be moved around and transplanted where the gardener wants them - leaving only 1 or 2 mother plants to mature and scatter seeds in an out-of-the-way location.

Steve

PaulF
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Location: Brownville, Ne

Fifty-some years ago when I first visited the home of my wife-to-be, her mother went out into the yard and picked a whole bunch of weeds, brought them into the kitchen and as she said,"cooked up a mess of greens." For several generations my wife's family supplemented their meals with those greens.

Sixteen years ago we retired to the same home after her parents passed away. The third generation of the family to live in the house no longer goes out to "pick a mess of greens." Many of those "weeds'' are still in the landscape except for stinging nettles and poison ivy but our eating habits have changed (I think our financial situation is different, too).

Now the greens we eat are grown intentionally in the garden spaces. Today the first of the asparagus is on the menu. Very soon it will be warm enough to plant the other "greens" we grow. Times have changed.

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applestar
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Location: Zone 6, NJ (3/M)4/E ~ 10/M(11/B)

Historically, many of these so called “weeds” were intentionally brought and planted as pot herbs, and apparently the pioneer migration across the American continent can be traced by where they have established and grow prolifically…. 8) :flower:

I’m saving my stinging nettle patch for making dark green (high in chlorophyll) herbal tea as well as a part of my Butterfly Garden larval host plant for Red Admirals. As soon as I see egg laying adults and signs of caterpillar activity, I stop harvesting until the butterflies finish eclosing and the plant grows a new flush of leaves in the fall. It’s gratifying to see the colorful Red Admirals start to fly from or near the nettle patch in the summer. It’s also useful for making nitrogen-rich liquid fertilizer or adding to bokashi or compost bin… or simply as cut-and-drop mulch (I put the clippings around crops that are experiencing vole or chipmunk pillaging in hopes that they are susceptible to the stinging hairs :twisted: )

I have garlic chives too — they are easy to grow from seeds and are winter hardy in this area, establishing solid clumps. The tender strappy leaves are terrific for mild garlic flavor in stir-fries and omelette. Tender flowerbuds are yummy too, and yes! Butterflies and bees love the flowers.

I also forgot Magenta Spleen which is basically lambs quarters with magenta pink-colored new growths and stem end leaves — I was gifted seeds for this from a gardening forum friend in …wow I don’t remember …Croatia?… about 8 years ago?…. She called it Tree Spinach. I still grow it from saved seeds and save seeds.

The problem with this, lambs quarters, orach, and also purslane is that as soon as temperatures start to get hot, leafminers — and I think this is the fly maggot type — invade and make it very difficult to harvest good leaves. So I really only have a short harvest window in out practically non-existent frost-to-summer spring season. (And guess what, this is the busiest planting period :roll: — I don’t know how many times I’ve looked at nice healthy clump thinking they are just right size for harvesting but I’m too exhausted to think about picking and cleaning them to cook — I think they don’t freeze particularly well raw and need to be at least blanched after washing, picking through, removing damaged parts, unnecessary or too hard stems, etc…..)

imafan26
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Location: Hawaii, zone 12a 587 ft elev.

I have tomatoes, bitter melon, and purslane weeds in my yard, and the occasional papaya that gets planted by the birds.
I have two currants now and I have already gotten a few tomatoes from them. The birds are eating them too, so I guess I am robbing their tomatoes. The bitter melon fruit and leaves are both edible and nutrient dense. I usually pull it and give it away. Someone else has to clean it. The wild ones are extra bitter, but some people like that. The papaya are usually sweet. The birds only eat the sweetest fruit. I do have to pick them before the birds get them. I tried the purslane, I don't really like it.

A few of my basil and culantro have reseeded and so technically they are weeds since I have to move a lot of them because they are the right plant in the wrong place. I have allspice growing in my yard. I have to keep killing it because it is hard to pull out and it will become a tree. The leaves can be used for cooking as well as the seeds. It has a clove like aroma.



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