Note: This post only covers milkweed flowers. I’ve collected all of my knowledge on milkweed into a mother guide for you that covers all the edible parts in my Guide to Milkweed. Nothing makes a beautiful Midwestern landscape pop quite like the deep purple milkweed flowers of the summer. They also make gardens look…
Garden
Common Amaranth: Amaranthus retroflexus & Friends
For me, amaranth is the king of greens to pick in the mid to late summer. Amaranth is a great-tasting, delicious wild green you should get to know, with culinary traditions around the world, especially in India where it’s used to make saag and other things, and, in Jamaica and the Carribbean, where it’s known…
Bergamot / Monarda Fistulosa / Wild Oregano
Wild herbs: two words that conjure up thoughts of exotic flavors, aromas, and special dishes. But what sort of herbs are there you can pick in the wilderness? Hands down, the easiest to identify and harvest, from my experience is bergamot and other species of plants in the family of Lamiacae, also known as the…
Kale Sprouts
Imagine for a moment the wonder that could be if Brussels sprouts and kale had little babies. Now, contain your excitement, because it is a thing, and has been for a number of years. They also go by the name of kalettes, and they’ve been popping up all over the place, from conventional grocery stores to Trader…
How to Cook Cardoons
Cardoons. An giant thistle related to artichokes Darwin classified as a pest species. Every since I read about these in a book by Lorenza de Medici I wanted to eat them. It took until I was on the email list of a kooky Eastern European farmer that I got my chance to cook some. I…
In Search of White Tomatoes
If you’re not striving for perfection, you’re striving for mediocrity: a maxim I picked up along the way somewhere and one that I like to share with my staff often. Whatever we are cooking should be the best that we can make in the moment, anything else is just not good enough. The standard should…
Broccoli Leaves
Yes, you can eat broccoli leaves, and they’re delicious, but even as a veteran chef, until I met some farm broccoli growing in a garden I didn’t know about them at all. I was walking through one of the large gardens at my girlfriend’s family farm, clipping some weeds (purslane, amaranth) to bring to…
Carrots Glazed in Carrot Juice, with Wild Carrot Flowers and Seeds
Wild carrot is up, one of the last wildflowers we’ll see in the Midwest. The flavor is nice and carrot tasting, but it’s delicate, subtle, too many other things in a dish will overpower it. Most of the time I just sprinkle the flowers and seeds on simple things, raw, unadulterated. A couple weeks ago…
