Eat Your Weeds

I've been working on my program for the Madison, Wisconsin Herb Society, April 24, "Eat Your Landscape." For that program I'll focus on some of the surprising landscape plants useful for food, as well as a few native plants. I'll also put in a pitch for not using chemicals on the lawn. What good is an entire lawn of just boring, green grass, when all it does is cost you money for chemicals, and time mowing?

You may have heard me say before that I insist that the plants I grow to justify the space they occupy in my garden and landscape. Being edible is an instant justification. So the lawn, of just grass serves as open space, green grass and meditation time (me, sitting on the lawnmower). But I don't want just grass. I'd rather have a lawn full of wildflowers and edible plants, mixed in with the grass. Following here, are edible plants from my lawn. You might notice if I used lawn herbicides, none of these great spring flowers would exist.

This great little plant, chickweed, (first photo, above), is a money maker for the lawn chemical companies. You can buy the herbicide and spread it, and like magic, the plant turns yellow and dies. Mine does that, without chemicals. Once it blooms, as you see here, it sets seed, turns yellow and dies. Don't spray it. Mix it with some of the other plants that follow and cook like spinach. Or, just a plain, chickweed quiche. It also makes a good first-aid salve for insect bites.

The next plant, henbit, is the nightmare for those anal gotta-have-a-perfect, weed-free lawn guys. (Men, for some reason, when they retire, become obsessed about green grass in their front yard. I know men who physically dig individual dandelions, obsessed with just one "flaw" in their lawn. My theory is they've had a business, or worked for one, where they had control over people and events. Once retired, the only thing they really have control over, is their own lawn. The lawn reminds them, they've been put out to pasture!) Like chickweed, henbit dies on its own soon after flowering. Cook it with other greens and serve it with cornbread. It's best harvested before flowering for best flavor. Wild onions, seen here with both the tops and the bulbs, just adds seasoning. They're strong flavored but in a quiche, or a pot of greens, they're perfect. Those onions you buy in the store - those are just educated cousins of the wild ones.

To the pot of greens, you can add some dock,  seen below with the long, narrow leaves. Add that along with violet leaves. The flavor just gets better, the more you add. Dock should be picked when young, before it gets tough. The smaller, younger leaves are the best to use.

Then the dandelion, which isn't native to the U.S., but escaped here 2 or more centuries ago. An incredible wine can be made from the flowers, and I've described it as, "liquid sunshine." I gather the young leaves and add them to the greens pot, or to any of several dishes.

Fiddlehead ferns, though, are in a different category of wild plants. These tasty little morsels are too good for the greens pot. Rub off some of the fuzz with your thumb and forefinger, put a pat of butter in a saute pan and simmer for about 5 minutes, salt and serve. Or dip in a batter and fry. Stir fry in a dish with mushrooms and chicken. Make fritters. Or....fiddlehead soup, a real spring treat. Here's a recipe.

Then there are violets, the source for violet freezer jam I wrote about in the previous post. Whether it's the one pictured here, called, "Freckles" or the regular wild purple violets, the leaves are good enough to eat, too. Same uses as the plants above, greens, omelettes, quiches, pick the tenderest leaves and flowers for adding fresh to salads.

So there you have it, all the food from my lawn, all of which would not exist if I sprayed the lawn with chemicals that kill everything that isn't grass. I'll gather enough for several dishes before these helpful wildflowers are gone for the year. They justify their existence quite nicely, require no maintenance, and cost nothing to tend. All I have to do is look out the breakfast window at the lawn and be grateful for a non-perfect, wonderfully edible yard.

In my opinion, the very best field guide to edible wild plants, and the recipes for using them, is still Billy Joe Tatum's Wild Foods Field Guide and Cookbook. You can still find copies here.

Save money and chemicals, let your lawn go native this year and you will be rewarded with something other than boring, green grass. Free meals and a beautiful, natural lawn. Happy gardening!