I took a walk this morning and gathered some wild edibles from the yard for a breakfast omelette. I made some art while walking in the rain-wet wild, or should I say soothed my soul...
In this mandala, you will find mostly wild plants, one feral (Arugula flower), one horticultural (Forsythia flower). The wildflowers are Ground Ivy, Purple Dead Nettle, 2 types of Violets, Dandelion, and Redbud. The wildleaves are Cleavers, Dandelion, and Trout Lily with the spirals of fern fronds just beginning.
Can you recognize them all? If not, time to get out the field guides and go into the field, learn a plant a week...or a month and in a few years you will have a repertoire. Make sure that part of your learning includes learning about the habitat and ecosystem you find the plants in and their role including whether they are invasive, rare, slow-growing, endangered, native, common, tenacious, etc. You want to know *if* you should harvest and *how* to harvest if you do. You'll want to know if there are poisonous look-alikes and how to tell them apart. You'll want to know if you can only eat certain parts of the plant, or only eat it in certain seasons. You'll want to know if the plant is an annual, biennial, or perennial as this affects harvesting guidelines. You'll want to know if it has medicinal qualities and what they are, and so on... Truly learn and study the plant before harvesting and eating a wild plant.
"The
traveler has to knock at every alien door to come to his own, and one
has to wander through all the outer worlds to reach the innermost shrine
at the end."
- Rabindranath Tagore
I chopped up the bigger pieces and added some Garlic Mustard, see picture below. This is one plant that you can freely harvest anytime and should actually pull it up by its roots and dispose of the roots in the trash if you do not eat them, not the compost. It is one of the worst invasives that no amount of purposeful eradication seems to work, so you can't get rid of it even if you try, and I have tried for many years on my property as it crowds out natives and other less tenacious plants. I still always have it, lots of it. So harvest away.
I then mixed this with good
eggs (good meaning not out of a battery cage like most eggs bought and sold) and cooked it in local lard from
happy pigs and put this on sprouted, whole-grain bread with extra virgin olive oil and salt. All organic, all ways.
Here's why.
It tastes fresh, green, vibrant, and alive! just like spring itself - a perfect way to start the day.
Plus you get to eat spirals. :)
“The moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves
too. All sorts of things occur to help one that would never otherwise
have occurred. A whole stream of events issues from the decision,
raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents and meetings
and material assistance, which no man could have dreamed would have come
his way.” – Goethe
