Eating dandelions. (Foraging thread!)

Post Reply New Topic

Excuse me if this has been mentioned already but I think I've seen dandelions or like leaves in store bought salad mixes before. They also had dandelion at a restaurant I went to once.

Wow, this would be a good idea. I tried picking nettles once, but no matter how much I shook them and washed them, they were still crawling with massive amounts of spiders, flies, and insects. Would that apply to dandelions, I wonder?

I've never had bugs in dandelions,the main thing is getting tender young leaves.I pick them mostly for my iguana.
Here is a pic of Maypops or passion fruit.They are better when they are yellow and wrinkled but the animals usually get their first.
[img][800:720]http://i1326.photobucket.com/albums/u660/2lucky4snuffy/3dd0e588999d887e8dba9a6e6eb02bd3_zps03720af7.jpg[/img]
Here is one sliced with a quarter for size comparison,a sassafras root for tea in the back,and some really big cayenne peppers.
[img][800:720]http://i1326.photobucket.com/albums/u660/2lucky4snuffy/37e48f7aeeb4df23f70dd5bb86f9e576_zpse8898794.jpg[/img]
Muscadines,yummy.
[img][800:720]http://i1326.photobucket.com/albums/u660/2lucky4snuffy/30a8f55c8c3c280b2e93294c21258f48_zpsce176333.jpg[/img]
Black Walnuts,I'll maybe get another bucket.Not many this year.One year we got a pickup bed full and sold them.
[img][800:720]http://i1326.photobucket.com/albums/u660/2lucky4snuffy/202dd8db603d572ea2ff0710ae253225_zps60242090.jpg[/img]

I picked up 65 black walnuts yesterday. It took like 2 hours to get 32 hulled, oooh boy. Hope it's worth my time.

I also got a bunch of rose hips. The bigger ones I tried picking at the beach went bad too quickly, but these smaller ones that are less rotund shaped seem better. My Asian market has gobs of rose hips growing.

Also, Concords, I'm picking the last of them. Actually make a very good grape juice. Like nice and extremely strong tasting. I boiled 1 cup grapes per 1L water. Turned out fantastic. I plan to gather the most Concords possible and then freeze them so I can have high quality grape juice all year. Hopefully my homemade rosehip tea turns out nice, too. I bought some at the Polish market just so I could make sure it'd taste good, and I like it. So homemade should be good, and cheap, too. Woohoo.

Black walnuts you can make a machine to hull them, but I think I'd only do that if I had my own tree.

You can hull them in on a paved driveway by driving over them.We will take ours to a hulling station.Then there is a big lever type black walnut cracker that works great,mount it to a sturdy block of wood,and you can crack them easy.It would only be worth investing in if you have a lot of the nuts.They are everywhere here.But a hammer works,they are hard to crack.

I've read up on this and now I want to sauté some dandelion leaves!

[img][800:720]http://i1326.photobucket.com/albums/u660/2lucky4snuffy/e287116b6d7e638c83dfa09fa43391a2_zpsa364b2bb.jpg[/img]
Coral mushrooms,I'm going to sauté them in butter.

Wow, those looks so good! Do you think it is possible to use some of those that you took and grow them in your garden?

They grow in the woods,I have some there.These came from a narrow valley by a little creek,there are tall bluffs there and it's shady and damp.They are bigger than the ones around my place.I don't think they would grow in a real sunny area.
Someone grew Shiitake mushrooms in this area,they drilled holes in oak logs and inoculated them.You have to keep the logs really moist and I think they fruit for a couple tears.Its something I've been meaning to try.Maybe this spring.