I read somewhere that this is a good time of year to pick young dandelion leaves. You can steam them and eat them like spinach, or eat them raw in a salad. They have a slightly bitter taste, rather like watercress or radicchio. You can also apparently eat primrose flowers (they don't seem to taste of anything much but they look pretty). So last night I combined them in a spring salad.Spring Salad
Fill a pint jug with young dandelion leaves, from plants that have not yet flowered. Give them a good wash and remove any leaves that are brown or spotted, and any bits of grass you may have gathered by accident. Add a couple of quartered hard-boiled eggs, and a few washed primrose flowers. Make a dressing by putting 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a jam jar with 1 teaspoon of cider vinegar, a crushed clove of garlic and plenty of ground sea salt and freshly ground black pepper. Tightly seal the jam jar and shake vigorously, then toss the salad in the dressing.
8 comments:
Sounds good. Of course you must be careful where you pick the dandelion leaves from just in case they have had weed killer or something sprayed on them. I the "olden" days the roots were used as a substitute for coffee I believe!
Good point, Ruth. These were picked from my own garden where dandelions sadly flourish.
If you had some burdock to supplement your crop of dandelions, you could make up some Dandelion & Burdock Cordial. My grandmother used to make it years ago. I remember it had a rather bitter and very strange flavour, but one that always left me wanting to try it again!
yum. and pretty!
Sarah Raven's "The Great Veg Plot" has a pretty comprehensive list of edible flowers, and i think - although i could be wrong - that Carol Klein's "Grow your own veg" has one too. I do know you can eat the heads of chive flowers, which look really pretty in a bowl of salad, a lovely purplish colour.
in my case i won't be eating dandelion leaves from the garden if only because we have a dog, who does pee in there!!!
keth
xx
Very pretty.....:0)
During the Second World War, and for quite a while after it, I remember following my Mum down the lane near our house and helping to pick dandelion leaves and young nettles AND hawthorn leaves to eat. We were also fond, in our house, of nasturtium leaves and my Mum used to pickle the nasturtium seed pods. She used to call them mock capers.
Pickled Nastursham pods sound fantastic. We love capers and use them loads. I too grew them in my previous house, and then the blackfly hit!!!!!
Living in the city, in Canada, with so many people and pets running around it nice that we can buy dandelion leaves at the grocery store:) I haven't really tried them yet.
Some families that live around us always make their wine with them and they don't seem to care too much about where the dandelions come from as long are there are many to pick all at once:) I hear the wine is really good:)
Maybe I'll be bold now and buy a bunch, supposed to be good for the things that ail me:)
Nancy
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