Thursday, April 2, 2009

Eating like a rabbit...

We've spent a lot of time in our garden, and we have many tiny green leaves, but we have at least a month before anything is ready to eat. But it's spring and it feels wrong to buy my leafy greens from the store, so I turned to the yard. I've been told that the pilgrims planted dandelions as salad greens, and I like the thought of them crossing the ocean with a bag of dandelion fluff. You have to catch the plants before they flower, and pick them from a yard that is free of chemicals, but they are a lovely sour/bitter spring green. Brad and I used a trowel to pop the plants from our yard, and they do make a lovely popping sound when the root lets go of the soil and you end up with the whole plant in your hand. Two nights ago we had a dinner of bread, cheese (munster gerome, yum) and wilted dandelion salad. Last night we ate orecchiette with dandelions, ricotta, and pine nuts. Spring, spring, spring!

Wilted Dandelion Salad

Pick a colander full of unflowered dandelion greens, cut off roots.

Wash well to remove grit, pick out anything that isn't dandelion, dry and put in serving dish.

Melt 2 spoonfuls of bacon grease in a small fry pan, (What? You don't save bacon grease in a small jar in your fridge? Fine, use olive oil.)

Sauté 3 large crushed garlic cloves in bacon grease until tan, pour over greens, toss, salt and pepper and serve.

4 comments:

  1. :) I haven't had wilted dandelion salad in FOREVER! Mamaw used to make it every spring :) We ate dandelion greens and another "wild" green but I can't remember the name (I just remember what it looked like....big full leaves that you had to get before they turned tough). I am so loving reading your blog ;)

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  2. I'm glad you enjoy the blog! I love writing things for it! Mamaw was such a neat lady, I smile just thinking about her :)

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  3. I never knew how to do that. I figured it wasn't what I used to do in grade school (pick piles of dandelion leaves and eat them raw, pretending to be a unicorn). Thanks for the instructions -- I hope I haven't already eradicated all my 'lions!

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  4. i didn't know unicorns like dandelions! in grade school i use to drink the rainbow covered puddles at the side of the road beacause i thought it would turn me into a fairy... this was a bad idea.

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