Re: Gathering food
Hey, I'm all about free food sources....! : )
We never spray our yard, so every spring I make a point of picking, with the help of the kids, the first dandelion greens that come up (pick them before they flower or they'll be too bitter to eat). It's just for fun --although the greens are actually very nutritious (I find them particularly good cooked in lentil soup, but also fresh in salads). They can be harvested again in the fall -- after frost (when they lose their bitterness again).
When the dandelions do start to flower (which they do all at once), we gather the blossoms and make dandelion syrup (or jelly, if I have the pectin on hand). We also do this with violet blossoms -- which we also have lots of in our yard. The colors of syrup/jelly they make (sunny golden yellow, and the deepest purple ever) are REALLY striking....
A few years ago, the Chinese nanny of a neighbor was over, and recognized something growing wild in our yard and the yard next door as an asian vegetable of some sort -- very chive-like. She carefully picked it all for us, and I cooked it up in a stir-fry ...
We do have a few overgrown mulberry trees on our property -- but the berries are far too high up to reach! I would gather them for sure if I could (yes, they can be on the bland side -- but nothing a few squirts of fresh lemon juice can't liven up)....
We also have an aged apple tree that produces a bounty every other year. They are not baking apples (as I discovered when I tried making pie with them once), but I do have a juicer (given to me by a friend) so I gather them up and run them through that (sometimes canning the juice). And, they're not bad in sauce either...(this year ought to be a producing year, so I need to brace myself ......).
The church we go to has several dwarf crab apple trees. Their purpose is ornamental of course, but I've noticed they do produce a LOT of fruit -- heh, if it's not too obnoxious, I'm thinking of asking to gather them this year to make crab apple jelly....
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