Food from the wild – nature’s own larder In English
Mar 22, 2016
Food from the wild– nature’s own larder
In English
Common chickweed – Stellaria mediaChickweed salad (2 portions)
1 large bunch chickweed
3 tablespoons French dressing
3 teaspoons sweet cicely, chopped
2 juicy apples, diced
Rinse the chickweed and mix with the
apple. Mix the sweet cicely and French
dressing. Pour the dressing over the salad
and toss. Ready to serve!
Chickweed soup (6 portions)
1½ litres chicken stock
6 spring onions, finely sliced
1 large potato, peeled and diced
2 bunches chickweed, chopped (save a
few sprigs for garnish)
salt
freshly ground pepper
300 ml cream
Bring the stock to the boil in a large pan.
Reduce the heat and add the onion,
potato and chickweed. Simmer for 10-15
minutes. Season with salt and pepper.
Whizz everything except the cream in the
blender. Return to the pan and add the
cream. Heat through. Garnish with a few
sprigs of chickweed.
Chickweed is mainly
used as a salad, but
also in soups and it is an
excellent substitute for
spinach. The best way to
pick it is to cut off the up-
permost, younger parts
of the plant.
Chickweed is something that many people curse in
their gardens. It is an annual and is easy to remove
but, if left alone, it spreads easily, producing many
seeds that are quick to germinate. The stem can
form roots, and this also helps the plant to spread
and form large mats of foliage. Common chickweed
can be recognised by the fine hairs on only one side
of the stalk. Chickweed appears early in the spring,
remaining green until the snow arrives. It contains all
the vital amino acids, making it an excellent source
of protein.
Stinging nettle – Urtica dioica
Nettle soup (4 portions)
2 litres fresh nettles
butter
2 tbsp flour
1 litre water
2 vegetable stock cubes
salt and white pepper
1 large onion, chopped
1 clove of garlic, chopped
2 potatoes
150 ml single cream
Rinse the nettles in several changes of water
and cut the leaves away from the stalks.
Place the leaves in boiling, salted water.
Boil for 5 minutes and discard the water.
Fry the onion and garlic in the butter. Boil
the water in a pan with the stock cubes.
Add the nettles, onion and potato. Simmer
for about 15 minutes or until the potato is
cooked. Whizz in a blender and season
as required. Add the cream and serve hot,
together with newly baked bread.
The most common use
for the stinging nettle is
for soup, but the plant
can also be dried,
powdered and used in
bread, or used as a green
vegetable in other dishes
such as pies and soufflés.
Most people probably have a special relationship with
nettles on account of their stinging hairs. Pick nettles
early in the spring, but use gloves to avoid being
stung. The plant contains a number of important
mineral substances such as iron. New plants grow
up quickly where nettles have been picked, so young
nettles can be enjoyed all summer. But they are
nevertheless best in the spring.
Stinging nettles can be mistaken for white dead-
nettles. They, however, do not sting, and there is no
problem if they are mistaken for each other as the
white dead-nettle is edible too. It has white flowers
that have a sweet taste and which attract bees, so it
is sometimes called the bee nettle.
Garlic mustard – Alliaria petiolata
Dip
300 ml crème fraiche, sour cream or
Turkish yoghurt
100 ml finely chopped garlic mustard
½ tsp salt
white pepper
Try adding other herbs such as basil, chilli
or paprika.
Mix crème fraiche with the garlic mustard.
Add other herbs as desired, and season to
taste. Serve with sticks of carrot, cucum-
ber and peppers, crisps or cheese-grilled
nachos.
The leaves of garlic mustard should be picked and
used before the plant blooms. If a leaf is rubbed
between the fingers, it can be recognised by its cha-
racteristic oniony smell. Justice is best done to the
taste if used fresh in, for instance, a tomato salad,
with salted fish and smoked or salted meat. If it is to
be used in hot dishes such as flavouring in a soup,
it should be added at as late a stage as possible so
that the special oniony taste does not disappear.
Common sorrel – Rumex acetosaSorrel and currant pie
Pastry
125 g butter
300 ml flour
100 ml sugar
1 tbsp water
Filling
20 fresh sorrel leaves
400 ml redcurrants or blackcurrants
200 ml sugar
Mix the ingredients for the pastry and use
it to line a pie dish. Bake for about 10
minutes at 225o. Add the filling. Put back
in the oven for another 20 minutes.
Serve warm, with whipped cream or vanilla
ice cream.
Sauce 1
Bring cream to the boil, whisk in fish stock
and add knobs of cold butter. Add roughly
chopped, blanched sorrel leaves. Season
with salt, pepper and a touch of saffron.
Sorrel can be recognised by its
sharp taste and by the arrow-shaped
leaves that have two small lobes at
the base. The plant should be eaten
in moderation as it contains oxalic
acid, which can damage the kidneys
in large doses. Sorrel can be used in
many dishes and is particularly good
with different types of fish. It can also
be used to flavour sauces and in
salads and sandwiches.
Sauces for salmonSauce 2
100 ml single cream
100 ml crème fraiche
sorrel leaves according to taste
salt, pepper, lemon
Mix all the ingredients in a blender.
Sweet cicely – Myrrhis odorata
Sweet cicely soup (4 portions)
2 litres sweet cicely leaves
20 leaves of wild garlic or 1 large onion,
chopped
1 tbsp butter
2 tbsp flour
1.25 litres stock
salt and pepper
100 ml whipping cream
Blanch the sweet cicely leaves. Save the
water. Whizz the leaves in a blender. Melt
the butter in a pan. Add the wild garlic or
onion to the butter and soften. Add the
sweet cicely and the stock. Simmer for a
few minutes. Thicken with the flour mixed
in a little water. Season and add
the cream.
At first sight, sweet cicely looks like a particularly
coarse, bushy wild chervil, but the strong scent of
aniseed or liquorice and the light green, hairy leaves
give it away.
Sweet cicely is a species that was introduced for
cultivation and has then become wild. It has grown
in Sweden since the 17th century at least. Don’t
mistake it for the extremely poisonous hemlock,
which you can see in Fredriksdal’s garden of bene-
ficial plants, in plot 4B. It does not smell of liquorice
and it has red markings on the stalk, unlike sweet
cicely. Hemlock is well known as an ingredient in the
poisonous draught that killed Socrates.
Sweet cicely can also
be used to make a
delicious green snapps
with a pleasant liquo-
rice flavour. Put the
plant into unflavoured
snaps (32%) and allow
to stand in daylight for
about one week.
Ground elder is a plant that is both loved and loat-
hed. It is an invasive weed but also a delicious edible
plant. It likes well nourished soil and, since it spreads
with rootsuckers, it is difficult to eliminate. The large
size of the clumps make it easy to get at and to
pick. The young leaves can replace spinach in many
dishes. In the Middle Ages, up until the 1700s, it
was popular to cultivate ground elder and, apart
from being a food, it was used medicinally since it
was thought to cure a particular type of gout called
podagra or “port wine toe”.
Ground elder pie (4 portions)
Pastry
300 ml flour
125 g butter
4 tbsp water
Filling
2 litres ground elder leaves
1 large onion
vegetable stock
Egg batter
3 eggs
300 ml milk
200-300 ml grated cheese
black pepper
Mix the ingredients for the pastry and use
it to line a pie dish. Bake at 250° for 10
minutes until the pastry is biscuit-coloured.
Chop the onion and fry until soft. Blanch
the ground elder for 10 minutes. Discard
the water and chop the leaves finely. Mix
with the onion and add the stock. Put the
mixture in the pastry case. Whisk the eggs
and milk together. Add the cheese and
season with black pepper. Pour onto the
filling and bake for 30 minutes.
Ground elder - Aegopodium podagraria
Water mint – Mentha aquatica
Water mint muffins (12)
2 tbsp dried water mint leaves, or 4 tbsp
fresh leaves
50g butter
125 ml milk
2 eggs
200 ml sugar
300 ml flour
1½ tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla sugar
Heat the oven to 175°. Put muffin cases
onto a baking sheet. Melt the butter and
pour in the milk. The mixture should be
tepid. Whisk the eggs and sugar until fluffy
and add the mint. If fresh mint is used,
this can be liquidised into the egg mixture.
Add the milk and butter mixture. Mix the
flour, baking powder and vanilla sugar and
add to the mixture. Spoon into the muffin
cases. Bake in the middle of the oven for
about 30 minutes.
Water mint grows in wet meadows, along streams
and on lake shores. It is easily recognisable from the
smell of mint that is released if you rub the leaves
between your fingers.
Herbal tea
Try making a delicious tea
with a few stalks of fresh
mint. Put them into boiling
water, remove the pan
from the heat and allow to
infuse for 5 minutes. The
tea is good for digestion
and soothing if you have
a cold.
Look at the square-shaped stalk
and opposite leaves in pairs. The
plant is mainly used as a flavou-
ring but also as an ingredient in
many dishes.
Fat hen is an annual weed that is common in
gardens and fields. The colour of the leaf varies
from light green to dark grey-green, but the leaves
always have a whitish undercoating. The flowers
mature quickly and form small seeds that can be
used as flour.
Fat hen in peppers (4 portions)
4 large peppers
2 litres fresh leaves of fat hen
200 ml brown rice
100 ml thinly sliced leek
1 clove of garlic
black pepper
herbs
100 ml grated cheese
Cook the rice. Halve the peppers length-
wise and remove the seeds. Fry the leek
and garlic. Blanch the fat hen. Mix the
onion with the rice and add the fat hen.
Season to taste. Fill the peppers with the
mixture. Sprinkle the cheese on top and
cook at 250° for 15 minutes or until the
cheese has melted.
Fat hen – Chenopodium album
There are many different
types of chenopodium.
All are edible and have
been used as food for
at least 2,000 years. Fat
hen has been found in
the stomach of 2,000-
year old human remains.
The leaves can be used
as spinach but, histori-
cally, the plant has been
used mainly as a flour
substitute, with bread
being baked from milled
seeds. Fat hen has a high
nutritional value. It has a
high level of carbohydra-
tes and protein and also
contains iron, calcium and
vitamin C.
Wild garlic – Allium ursinumWild garlic soup (4 portions)
1 litre vegetable or chicken stock
200 ml cream
40 wild garlic leaves
some spinach leaves
salt and pepper
150 g bacon, diced
6 tbsp whipped cream
juice of half a lemon
a little salt
Bring the stock to the boil with the cream.
Add the spinach and wild garlic leaves
and whizz in the blender. Season with salt
and pepper. Fry the bacon and season
the whipped cream with salt and lemon.
Pour the soup into bowls and add a little
whipped cream. Sprinkle the diced bacon
on top.
Wild garlic grows in deciduous woodlands in the
southern part of Sweden. The flowers have six
petals and resemble white stars. The leaves of wild
garlic resemble those of lily-of-the-valley, but they
are not likely to be mistaken for each other. Wild gar-
lic can be recognised by its strong smell and taste of
onion and garlic.
Even if wild garlic is relatively uncommon, it can be
found in very large clumps where conditions are
right. When dried or cooked, it loses much of its
taste and should therefore be as fresh as possible
when used. It is delicious in tomato salad.
Wild garlic pesto
1 bunch wild garlic
25 g pine nuts
salt
freshly milled black
pepper
100 ml olive oil
boiling water
50 g Parmesan cheese
Put the wild garlic leaves in the blender
together with the pine nuts and salt and
pepper to taste. Add the olive oil. Blend
until smooth. If necessary, add a little
boiling water to get the right consistency.
Add 50 g grated Parmesan cheese.
Large bittercress is a pretty
plant that grows in damp
ground such as marshes or
along streams. The leaves
have a pronounced taste of
cress that is well suited to
salads, especially tomatoes,
but they are also excellent
in sandwiches.
Bittercress sandwich
large bunch of fresh large bittercress
leaves
a large slice of bread
1-2 large slices smoked salmon
lettuce leaves
mayonnaise
lumpfish roe
Butter the bread and add the ingredients
according to taste.
Large bittercress – Cardamine amara
To make dishes visually appetising, we could use flowers a lot more than we do in
our cooking. It is mainly salads and gateaux that can be made even more tempting by
garnishing them with edible flowers. Ten wild plants are growing in the border, and their
flowers are all ideal for decoration; bitter vetch, sweet violet, red clover, alkanet, roses,
viper’s bugloss, woodruff, chicory, white dead-nettle, yellow archangel.
Flowers in our food
Copy:
Karin Hjelmér
Hans Lindqwist
Illustrations:
Tryggve Edevik
Design & layout:
Caroline Flindt
Fredriksdal museum and gardens
Gisela Trapps väg 1, 254 37 Helsingborg • Info phone: +46 (42) 10 45 00 • www.fredriksdal.se