Blue spruce, picea pungens, is native to the Rocky Mountains, but can be found as ornamental trees throughout the United States. The young shoots can be used to make tea high in vitamin C. This bitter, resinous drink is surprisingly refreshing, although it is not uncommon for people to add a sweetener. Click on the image for a larger view.
Tag Archives: Edible Weeds
Daylily—Edible Plants
Our daylilies are emerging. While the daylily (hemerocallis fulva) is known as a decorative plant, it is also edible. This time of year we eat the young shoots by stir frying them in soy sauce and serving them on tofu. We harvest the shoots when they are only a few inches long. The ones pictured here would be a little too old. Click on the image for a larger view.
Small Cranberry
Small cranberry, Vaccinium oxycoccos, can be found in peat or acidic soils, which gives it its other common name, bog cranberry. This is one of the first plants to colonize burnt bogland and native Americans would burn bogs to stimulate its growth. Like the cultivated cranberry, these are tart. Naturally, this fruit is sought after by wildlife. This plant is on Little Moose Island at the tip of Schoodic peninsular in Acadia National Park. Click on the image for a larger view.
Blackberries, 2016
It is blackberry season again. This is our largest fruit crop of the year—we are just finishing up the blackberries we picked last year. We will spend August gathering these berries. Click on the image for a larger view.
Blackberry in Bloom
Our fruit plants are going through their annual flowering cycle. At the beginning of May, our wild plum was in bloom. The middle of may brought the blossoms out in our apple and peach trees. Now our blackberry canes are blossoming. These are in our field, but the blackberry under our forest canopy are also out. Click on the image for a larger view.
Thanksgiving Dinner
Naomi and I don’t eat meat. For Thanksgivings we made a stuffed kabocha. Kabocha is a well known squash in Japan. You can eat the cooked flesh by itself or stuff the entire fruit. For the stuffing, we used ingredients from our garden: plantain, spiderwort, day lilies, goutweed, and bush beans. We added some vegetarian sausage, mushrooms, croutons, and cheese. (This would be good for other holidays, feasts, or an everyday meal.) Click on the image for a larger view.
Giving Thanks
We wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving.
Today is Thanksgiving in the US. Like many people, we are celebrating the holiday with a meal. We have been using foods we have harvested from our garden. Two dishes I am really looking forward to are an apple pie with cranberries and a blackberry pie. The apples are from our tree of an unknown variety. The blackberries are from our field. Click on the image for a larger view.
Golden Hour
Blackberry Harvest 2015
A month ago, our blackberries were green. This week, we began our annual harvest. This usually lasts about a month depending on the size of the crop. It looks like it might be a good year. Click on the image for a larger view.
Queen Anne’s Lace—Edible Weeds
Queen Anne’s Lace, Daucus carota, was once cultivated in Europe as a vegetable and is a biennial plant. Like carrots, the roots and leaves of the first-year plant are edible. Flowers can be used raw in salads or fried. Seeds can be used for seasoning.
