We are so inured to shop-bought factory-farmed foods that we forget that all our foodstuffs originated in the wild. Indeed, everything we eat today started out life as a wild plant. Due to selective breeding cabbages and kale may not look much like their wild ancestors any more. Which is not to say that those wild ancestors don’t exist and remain perfectly edible.
If you know what to look for and how to recognize the plants then the wild harvest can provide many completely free delights for your table. What’s more wild foods are truly and completely seasonal and provide a sense of what our ancestors used to eat.
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There are a number of reasons you might want to use wild plants as food.
Wild plants have some unique flavors that can be among your enjoyed favorites. Watercress with something sweet such as pancake syrup in a peanut butter sandwich is one I particularly enjoy. Dandelion greens pesto mixed with spaghetti sauce is another.
Since the taste of many wild edible plants is so different from the usual cultivated vegetables, you likely will at first not accept some of them as a delicious flavorful food. Just about any food flavor other than sweet, salty, starchy, and fat are, I suppose, acquired tastes. It takes time for your mind to recognize an unfamiliar flavor as a ‘tried and true’ favorite. Introduce a wild food into your diet by eating a small amount when you are most hungry. Repeatedly doing so can make the new food one that you especially enjoy.
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