Also blossoming right now is our local yucca. Photo by Green Deane
Yucca filimentosa
Resembling a white flame in flatwood areas Yuccas are blossoming now. While there are many species our most common is yuccca filamentosa pictured left) It’s blossoms are bitter… not while you’re eating them but a half a minute later. To bad, as they have a pleasing mouth feel and texture The best thing to do is to boil the flowers for a few minutes that reduces or eliminates the bitterness.After cooking you can chop them and add them to many different dishes including salads. There are several species of yucca that are edible raw.
colcannon
18th century cooking can serve foragers well. An Irish dish from that time period is colcannon which for us presents many options as it is mashed potatoes and greens. We could use Winged Yam and purslane.
Peel, dice and boil some potato. Blanch your greens in the hot potato water if preferred. Mash the potato, chop the greens finely (Squeeze dry) then mix with the mashed potato, add salt, pepper and butter (or cream.) Traditionally Colcannon is made with cabbage or kale though one can use any green. This is a way to use wild greens from the back yard and extend one’s potato stores. If you add chopped onion greens to the dish it’s called Champ. Of course you can add other herbs. Serve warm or chilled.
Podocarpus macrophyllus. Photo by Green Deane
It’s a long ways to August but the Podocarpus is making seeds and that means edible arils in a few months. The species is a bit strange in that we don’t eat the mildly-toxic seed. We eat the aril next to it which are very grape-like. They can be used as grapes, eaten off the bush or made into jelly and wine et cetera. The seeds are listed as toxic but I know of an adult who ate two at one time and had no issue. That said, don’t eat the seeds. When the Podocarpus fruits can be something of a guess. Locally I look for them in August. The fruit can last several weeks and are edible even when they begin to dry and look like raisins. Oddly, in a local park in downtown Winter Park, a few Podocarpus have escaped trimming and have grown into moderate-size trees. Those fruit in December and my only guess as to why is perhaps they are a different species. My video on Podocarpus is here and you can read about it here.
Blue Porterweed blossoms taste like raw mushrooms.
Do you like mushrooms but want to avoid some of dangers that come with fungi foraging? Then there is a subtle solution: Blue Porterweed. Found in flower gardens around the world and native to Florida the Blue Porterweed earned its name as a source for tea that tasted like porter beer. Someone had the fermenting idea to add yeast and sugar to a lot of tea and get a brew that tastes similar to porter beer, hence the name. The flower garden variety usually grows up and the local native grows horizontally. The blue flowers, raw, have a subtle flavor of mushrooms. You can read more about the Blue Porterweed here. Oh, and how did porter beer get its name? The same way porter steak did. Porters — baggage handles in old central London — worked all hours and needed quick food. Shops set up to meet that need and out of them came several dishes and named items. The leaf tea is and antianxiety tea.
Classes this weekend range from Ocala to Melbourne.Both classes have a lot of folks signed up.
Saturday April 30th,Saturday April 30th Jervey Gantt Recreation Complex, 2390 SE 36th Ave., Ocala, FL, 34471.9 a.m. to noon. Meet at the entrance to the pool, aka Aquatic Fun Center. To meet the demands of the city of Ocala, this is a free class, If you want to make a donation afterwards that is at your discretion.
Sunday May 1st, Wickham Park: 2500 Parkway Drive, Melbourne, FL 32935-2335. 9 am. to noon meet at the dog park inside the park.
Saturday/Sunday May 7th & 8th, 1624 Taylor Rd, Honea Path, SC 29654Honea Path, South Carolina, classes at 9 a.m. and 1 p.m. each day.
Saturday May 14th Dreher Park, 1200 Southern Blvd., West Palm Beach, 33405. 9 a. m. to noon Meet just north of the science center.
Sunday may 15th, Mead Gardens, 1500 S. Denning Dr., Winter Park, FL 32789. 9 a.m. to noon Meet at the bathrooms.
Candyroots vary in height. Photo by Green Deane
In the realm of plant populations there is endangered, threatened then rare. But there is a huge distance between rare and common. The yellow bloomer to the lft — Candyroot — is not on any about-to-disappear list but one doesn’t see them that often. You have to be at the right place — seasonally damp pine scrub — and the right season, May in Florida but it can be found later in the year. Candyroot comes in two colors, yellow that can sometimes make it to orange. Native Americans and early Europeans would chew the roots, which have a spearmint-esque flavor, or wintergreen, and to some palates licorice. It’s actually the pain reliever methyl silicate. The tap root is also rather small, so it’s not much of a chew. Kind of like a woodland breath mint. To read more about Candyroot you can click here.
You get the USB, not the key.
My nine-DVD set of 135 videos has been phased out and replaced by 171-videos on a 128-GB USB, see left. The USB videos are the same videos I have on You Tube. Some people like to have their own copy especially if social order falters. The USB videos have to be copied to your computer to play. If you want to order the USB go to the DVD/USB order button on the top right of this page or click here. That will take you to an order form. Or you can make a $99 donation, which tells me it is for the USB (include a snail-mail address.) I’d like to thank all of you who ordered the DVD set over the years which required me to burn over 5,000 DVDs individually. I had to stop making them as few programs now will read the ISO files to copy them. Burning a set also took about three hours.
Green Deane Forum
Want to identify a plant? Perhaps you’re looking for a foraging reference? You might have a UFO, an Unidentified Flowering Object, you want identified. On the Green Deane Forum we — including Green Deane and others from around the world — chat about foraging all year. And it’s not just about warm-weather plants or just North American flora. Many nations share common weeds so there’s a lot to talk about. There’s also more than weeds. The reference section has information for foraging around the world. There are also articles on food preservation, and forgotten skills from making bows to fermenting food. Recent topics include: Fermenting potatoeswith yogurt, make a water filter, nixtamalization at home, Stale Bread and Cod Liver Oil, Life’s a Grind, Killing Bugs with Tobacco Plugs, Eating weeds: Is it safe? Have they mutated? Not the Eastern Red Bug but the Pink Tabebuia, African Tulip Tree, Asparagus densiflorus, Green Deane’s Book… You can join the forum by clicking on the button on the upper right hand side of this page. This is my weekly newsletter #504. If you want to subscribe to this free newsletter you can find the sign-up form in the menu at the top of the page. My website, EatTheWeeds.com, which is data secure, has over 1500 plants on it in some 428 articles. I wrote every one myself, no cut and paste.
On a personal note, my rent is doubling. I need a place to move to. Currently renting a two-bedroom small house. Email Green Deane@gmail.com
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What’s blooming now? Wild Pineapple.
Wild Pineapple is very showy when in blossom. Photo by Green Deane
I live in Fort Myers, over the years I’ve attended two of your walk-tours years up in the Port Charlotte area. I still talk regularly to local folks about your knowledge of local edibles. There’s a 10,000 acre preserve just south of my house that appears to be a SW Florida pine/salt marsh. I would love to have you bring one of your classes through a natural environment that is so baron and sparse from my perspective. The name of it is : Estero Bay Buffer Preserve.
Thanks, Ralph
Gosh who would have ever thought that about Porterweed? Cool. Good newsletter !!