Eat weeds

A FIELD GUIDE TO FORAGING A book extract about finding food all around you, and a closer look at the dandelion, one of the most widespread forageable plants.

Your backyard is the best place to forage

There is food and medicine growing right outside your door, right now. It has always been there. Our backyard is the most intimate threshold between us and other species, the ones that have learnt to live close to us. It is a place where we experience countless interactions with nature – incidental exchanges, as well as the incredible unfolding of adaptation. There are insects in our backyards, lizards, birds and weeds. Some seem not-sofriendly, but most have a lot to teach us about ourselves and how our actions a ect the land around us.

Our backyard is our sanctuary. This little corner of the world, one that we tend to define with a fence and boundary pegs, is both the modern development of the process of domestication that allowed us humans to thrive as a species and the first step into the unpredictable results of our constant reckoning with natural processes.

Our backyard is a place where we define what belongs and wage war against the plants that do not fit into our social construct of what a garden should be. It is here that we see – day in, day out – the delicate dance between invitation and permission. We want to invite nature in, but not too much of it. We want diversity, but only of species we like or consider useful. We want growth and abundance, but keep hacking away at lawns and bushes that exceed the allocated space. We punish nature for its spontaneity and resilience, for doing what it wants, rather than what we want it to do.

Our backyard is where we learn about weeds

Many of the ‘wild’ plants growing in your yard are now termed ‘weeds’. They are regarded as pesky, uninvited, stubborn self-starters, yet a great number of them are among the world’s most ancient food plants, often o ering outstanding medicinal properties. When you take the time to get to know them, you will discover your backyard in fact holds a treasure trove of valuable plants.

By getting to know what grows in your yard you will discover a wilder nature, come to terms with coexistence and hopefully facilitate space for a flourishing biodiversity both in your garden and on your dinner table.

Backyard legalities and ethics

Not everyone owns their place, and often enough renters need to seek permission to grow food and alter the garden in any way; indeed, sometimes we are obliged to suppress weeds, even if they are actual food. This needs to be taken into account when opening up to the possibilities of a ‘wild garden’. Another important aspect that needs to be considered is the specific toxicities of our frontyards and backyards, which sometimes have high concentrations of lead, mercury or even arsenic, particularly if the property is an old house. It is possible to have your soil tested so that you know you are harvesting from clean ground, the same as you would do if you wanted to grow a vegetable garden.

“Back in the late 80s I studied to be a herbalist, and I learnt that the weeds that grow in our own backyard can

eaten and used for medicinal purposes. I have been collecting these valuable weeds ever since, as I understand that where they grow naturally is where the best nutrients for them to flourish are found. If you’ve ever tried to grow a dandelion or plantain in your garden, and it soon spreads its seeds and grows elsewhere, then you know you’ll be getting the best nutrients from the places where this plant grows. Always watch and listen to nature – she will teach you so much,” says Pat Collins, herbalist, naturopath and author of The Wondrous World of Weeds.

Dandelion Taraxacum o icinale

Dandelion is the quintessential edible weed, but probably best known for its promise of wishes granted when you blow the ‘parachute’ seeds away from the flu y seed head. We also use its flowers and stems in daisy chains.

For hundreds of thousands of years, humankind has been an accomplice in the spread of this plant – and in return the dandelion has provided us with food and healing. Yet we call it a weed. We demonise it, pull it up whenever we see it, slash it with the mower as soon as it flowers and generally discourage it from growing in our lawns. This plant knows us so well; it is used to the way we treat land and ecology, and has adapted accordingly. It is one of the most successful colonisers of disturbed land, sprouting up whenever it finds an opportunity.

Dandelions are an outstanding, beneficial and delicious co-evolutionary species. You are almost certain to find them growing within a couple of metres of your back door.

Identification

Leaves and stalks: The serrated leaves grow wide and flat in mown lawns and upright in high grass, when the plant is competing for sunlight. The leaves are dark green, with a light-coloured, hollow midrib. Sometimes the midrib has a red tinge, due to environmental stress or age. The leaf is deeply toothed, giving the plant its name: ‘dandelion’ is derived from the French dent de lion – lion’s tooth. Several tall, hollow, flowering stems arise from the plant’s base.

Flowers and seeds: The flower heads are made up of dozens of yellow, overlapping petals. Each flower head unfurls facing the sun and remains open for 1-2 days, before closing to form the seed head. A ball of flu y mini-parachutes then appears, ready for wind dispersion.

Snapshot: Dandelion is a low-growing herb, with long, toothed leaves radiating from a central crown at the base. It is an annual or biennial, growing to suit conditions, up to half a metre tall and wide.

Look-alikes: Lots of plants with a yellow flower and a clock of seeds are confused with dandelions, including sow thistle and flatweed. But both of these ‘false dandelions’ will have several flowers per stalk, while a dandelion will only ever have one flower per stalk.

As food

You can eat the whole plant: flowers, leaves, stem and root. Dandelion can be rather bitter – particularly the older plant – so it is advisable to eat it in conjunction with other less intensely flavoured greens.

I eat the leaves raw or cooked. When I was a kid, we used to collect the young leaves of early spring, mix them with other greens, add boiled eggs and season with a simple olive oil, salt and vinegar dressing. My siblings and I got used to the bitter taste; we even came to love it.

Dandelion root can be cooked like parsnip in soups, baked like a potato or slowly roasted and then ground for a healthy, co ee-like drink. The flowers can be eaten fresh, cooked in fritters and frittatas, or fermented into a wine. The flower buds can be pickled for an excellent treat, similar to capers.

As medicine

In herbal medicine, dandelion is regarded as the king of detox because of its properties as a mild diuretic and laxative. Dandelion infusions are regularly prescribed in cleansing programmes and are extremely beneficial as liver and kidney tonics. Dandelion is respected as a good source of antioxidants. It also reduces cholesterol, regulates blood sugar, reduces inflammation, lowers blood pressure, aids weight loss and digestion, boosts immunity and keeps skin healthy.