Foraging Wild Edibles in Your Neighborhood

Why work so hard to forage, when we have farms? Harvesting is the only way to get the freshest produce.

Unless you live on a farm, the only way to make the field to table short is to forage. To get to market, farmers have to harvest produce hours in advance, then load their vehicles, travel from farm to market site and then unpack the vegetables people come to buy.

Try this:

In the field, harvest a few leaves, blossoms or fruit leaf, flower, or fruit.

Taste one immediately. Save the other and taste it later.

How were the flavor and texture different? Did you also notice that the more you handle any fruit or vegetable, the more it gets bruised? That also impacts flavor.

Let's face it, whatever we pick and nibble in the field will taste better than anything brought home later.

Where else can you do your shopping while on a daily walk?

If you establish walking routines, you get to notice what is growing and where. Observe the life cycle of the plant, so you know where and when to find it, ensuring peak flavor whenever you take a walk. That will save time in the long run

Lamb’s Quarters Growing in a Tree Pit NYC

Quickweed growing in a flower pot.

In some urban and suburban neighborhoods residents plant flowers and vegetables. I've actually seen corn plants and tomato plants around some trees in sunny urban neighborhoods. People care about their homes and most of the time these bits of garden are well tended.

You can be sure that weeds will grow and if you are in a position to make friends, offer to help weed.

Good neighbor weeding:

First, trim the tender tops and then root out the weed. If it is not an invasive bully, why not replant that weed in your own window box if you have one? As you become better acquainted, these neighbors may be willing to let the lamb's quarters, purslane, and Asiatic day flower grow, knowing you won't let them crowd out their plants.

Now, you'll have a regular foraging place supported by your gardener neighbors.

I'm a forager in everything I do. I forage for farmed produce and household items left behind by former neighbors in addition to foraging wild foods. It's not just about saving money, it's also about keeping useful items out of the land fill.

In my perfect world, we'd all be foragers looking at our streets, roads and open spaces as places to nurture, rather than places to throw our garbage.

Is it a dream? Maybe. But in an often fast-paced, wasteful and stressful world, it's a pretty good dream.

Foraging Your Local Farmers' Markets

Why Forage at a Farmers' Market?

In my world, foraging is the quest for food, whether or not I'm the one who harvests the food. Farmers markets are ideal for beginning foragers. Everyone who shops there gets to:

*support local farmers and learn ways to get good value

*eat the freshest food - shortest time from field to table

*safely learn about the flavor and preparation of unfamiliar vegetables and fruit.

Looking for the best quality? Get there early.

While the farmers are setting up, it's easier to see what's available and the condition of the produce.

Looking for bargains? Cruise the market late in the day.

Farmers maybe willing to negotiate price, because it's more practical to take money than to transport unsold produce.

Strategies:

1. Say "hi" to the farmer. You'll be amazed at the rewards.

Last summer, I saw lamb's quarters with pink top leaves at a farmer's stand.

This clever farmer saved the seeds from the "weeds" in her garden, replanting this wild edible in another spot. After a few years of selective breeding for pink leaves, the farmer now has enough seeds to sell to a seed company.

Imagine that! A farmer has embraced a wild edible, lamb's quarters, and cultivated it for looks. The lines between farming and foraging are already merging.

2. Walk the entire market before buying anything. Notice the condition and the price of what is available.

3. Eat samples offered. Get an idea of the flavor and texture of unfamiliar items and find new ways to enjoy what you already love.

4. Once you decide where to buy, look at everything offered. If an individual fruit or vegetable has a bruise or a bit of damage on one spot, negotiate the price.

Disclaimer: The item has to have the right texture and the right color; it can't be overripe, crushed or moldy.

Next time, we'll head out to our neighborhoods.

Cattail Pollen Cookies: The Joyful Forager's Truly Original Recipe

Cattails have been called nature's supermarket because every part of this plant can be prepared as food or supplies.

The pollen that forms on the male flower head has the texture of pastry or bread flour and has been used in pancake and biscuit recipes for millennia.

Searching online for a cattail pollen cookie recipe, asking fellow foragers and posting to social media foraging groups yielded no cookie recipe.

There was nothing else for me to do but embrace the opportunity, and invent cattail pollen cookies.

Find my step-by-step directions for harvesting cattail pollen after the recipe.

Once you get home, the cattail pollen has to be sifted two or three times to remove bits of seed head fluff or any other non-pollen material. But once you sift the golden yellow powder, it's ready for use. Cattail pollen has remained fresh in my freezer for over two years. If it's in the refrigerator, it gets eaten within a few weeks, not because it is perishable, but because pollen is also delicious in salads, cereal and even as a thickener for soups and stews.

Here is my standard basic cookie recipe which makes it easy to create variations on the theme: 

JJ's Basic Cookie Recipe                                                                                                                                  1/2 cup coconut oil
3/4 cups of sugar - I use turbinado sugar
1 egg
1-1/2 cups of unsifted pastry flour
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbs flavor:
vanilla, maple syrup, rose water, or hazelnut
1/2 cup texture:
rose petals, pecans, walnuts, butternuts, cacao nibs, dates, coconut, oatmeal

JJ's Recipe Revamp                                                                                                                         

In this recipe I did not want any flavors or textures to compete with the cattail pollen so my revamp of myself used:

1/2 cup coconut oil
3/4 cup white sugar
1 tsp vanilla
1 egg
10 oz unsifted pastry flour
2 oz cattail pollen
1-1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Timeline                                                                                                                                                                  Late Spring to Early Summer: Once a year cattails produce pollen, usually in June in Northeast part of North America. Gather pollen when you see the top male cattail heads covered in bright yellow pollen. You can store the pollen in a freezer for at least one year.

Once harvested, sift the pollen to remove any bits of fluffy cattail flower head or other material. Once sifted, store in air tight containers in the freezer.

One Hour Before:                                                                                                                                           Combine coconut oil (or butter if you prefer) and sugar. If you use white sugar, the cookie may swell in size while baking.                                                                                                                                                  Combine flour, cattail pollen, baking powder and salt.                                                                                   Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Mix thoroughly and let the mixture cool in the refrigerator for 20-30 minutes.

Thirty Minutes Before:                                                                                                                                          Line a baking sheet with parchment paper.
Heat oven to 300 degrees
Remove mixture from refrigerator and make walnut size balls of dough
Place on cookie sheet and flatten to about 1/4 inch thick

15 Minutes Before:                                                                                                                                               Put cookies in preheated oven and bake 10 - 15 minutes, until underside of cookie is golden brown.           Remove from oven and let cookies cool before putting them on a dish.                                                       Serve and enjoy!

How to Harvest Cattail Pollen                                                                                                                       What You Will Need:                                                                                                                                    -Long thin bags, like a paper baguette bag
-Waders or other footwear to wade into wetlands
-Cattails growing in an area with no visible signs of pollution

Cattails typically grow in dense clusters, which makes foraging easier, but they grow in wetlands, marshes and other moist areas, which makes foraging a bit more of a challenge.

Cattails are part of Nature's clean-up crew, so look for a stand of cattails in an area that is not near a waste treatment plant or other industrial activity.

The brown cigar-shaped seed head is an unmistakable identifying feature of cattail. In the winter, these brown seed heads turn into a white fluff, which makes it easy to locate a stand of cattails before the tender shoots emerge in the spring.

Some people create small ponds as part of the landscape design on their property. It's possible to transplant the cattail rhizomes and grow them in these ponds.

When it comes to collecting cattail pollen, if you listen to the prevailing advice and shake the pollen into a paper or plastic bag, some of the pollen will land in the bag. A lot more will fly in to the air and land on you. A better strategy is to cover the entire flower head with a
bag and cut the flower head. Those long slender bags that baguettes come in work very well for this purpose.

There is a very short window of time when the pollen is available for collecting. Some years you only have a few days. Look for the fattest seed heads for the most pollen.

Once you have collected a number of seed heads, you will need to bring them home and sift the pollen to remove and fibers or insects. The pollen can be eaten raw sprinkled on salad, cereal or added to yoghurt. It can also be added as a thickener to soups and stews.

Some people claim it can be used as a substitute for saffron. That may be true for the color, but cattail pollen has a delicate flower taste. The fewer ingredients in the cattail pollen recipe, the more you will be able to taste the delicate cattail pollen flavor.

The pollen has no leavening agent, so when baking with it, you need to mix it with flour.

Whether you make pancakes, biscuits or cookies, the color of the dough will be a dazzling sunshine yellow.