Edible Weeds

If you can’t beat ‘em… eat ‘em

Eating weeds can be a fun activity!

Have you ever seen dandelion leaves in the grocery store and thought, “Why would I pay for dandelions? My back yard is full of them!” But have you tried it? It turns out that wild plants are often more nutritious and flavorful than cultivated plants. Many of the foods we buy in the grocery store are selected and cultivated to be large, pretty, and tough enough for transport, not necessarily for their nutritional value. Furthermore, grocery store produce has often spent several days or weeks in storage or transport. You can’t get anything fresher than a plant you harvest yourself!

Eradication by Mastication?

In an effort to assist in the battle against invasive species, some have highlighted the edible qualities of certain species. Restaurants have created invasive species menu items, organizations have hosted invasive species cook-offs, and some have written cookbooks. While there is no hard evidence that eating these invasive plants actually helps control their populations, it’s possible that harvesting the weeds could help control populations while they are still small (maybe in your backyard?). We encourage eating them as one option to dispose of them instead of sending them to a landfill, but also as a way to potentially help control them.

One reason some non-native plants become invasive is because they have no natural predators in their new region. Perhaps you can help do the job that natural predators would do in their native range. Eating wild plants also helps you become more aware of the nature around you, which in our biased opinions, is quite fun. Chomping on some weeds could also save you a few bucks on your grocery bill.

Disclaimer

There is a concern that if we encourage people to eat invasive species, some will want them to spread or will cultivate them for money. We must remember that we call some of these plants “invasive” for a reason. Many of these weeds have reproductive parts that can float downstream or move around on equipment, vehicles, wind, birds, or other animals. If you don’t keep your weeds in check, they could be a big problem for your neighbor, a nearby farm, a natural area, or future you! When some of these plants grow unchecked, they can cause people to lose a lot of money. So, please stay informed about the potential invasiveness of the plants you are considering.

The Do’s and Don’ts

Your neighbors might thank you if you ate a few of these.

Proper identification is crucial! If you’re not absolutely, positively sure about a plant, please don’t eat it! Some plants can be deadly. Please do take time to learn the proper plant parts (e.g., flowers, leaves, stems, roots). One plant part may be edible and delicious, while another is poisonous (Examples… Rhubarb stems are edible while the leaves are poisonous. Apples and cherries are tasty fruits, but their seeds contain harmful toxins. Potatoes and tomatoes are common foods we eat, but their stems and leaves are poisonous). Knowing the life stage of a plant is also essential. Many fruits are not edible until they are fully ripe. For others, plant parts may only be palatable when the plant is young; a mature plant’s leaves can often become bitter or tough. Furthermore, some plants must be cooked before they are edible.

Do start with common, easy to identify plants that don’t have poisonous look alikes. Any time you are trying a new plant, start with small amounts. People react differently, and anyone could be allergic to a certain plant that is edible for most. Don’t harvest plants in areas like roadsides, as the runoff contains toxins from traffic, and they are sometimes sprayed with herbicides. Also avoid eating plants that look wilted or have a blue tint, as they may have been sprayed with herbicide.

With native plants, always harvest sparingly! Take only a few leaves from several plants here and there. If you need the root or bulb, dig only a few plants from a cluster. On the other hand, with weedy non-native plants, you typically don’t need to worry. Go ahead and pick all the berries from that blackberry bush. They are tasty and you can help prevent further spread (birds love blackberries, but the seeds pass through their digestive tracts unharmed, causing the seeds to spread… but not if you eat them first!). If you eat all the leaves and flowers from the dandelions in your yard, it’s not going to be a problem. They will come back anyway. As a bonus, your neighbors may even thank you!

Getting started

We chose a few plants to get you started. These four weeds are fairly easy to identify, very common, and not listed as noxious weeds by the Oregon Department of Agriculture. However, they are non-native and typically considered to be nuisances.

Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale)

Dandelion flowers can be used in many recipes.

The dandelion is a very common weed, easy to identify, and highly nutritious (Contain vitamins A, B, C, D and E; potassium; calcium; iron; and zinc). It can be quite bitter, but with the proper timing and preparation, you can reduce the bitterness. For many plants, including dandelions, it’s best to eat the actively growing spring leaves (they look brighter, greener, fresher) before the plants are in flower. It also helps if the leaves are growing in moist, healthy soil with a bit of shade. You can also boil or saute the leaves to reduce the bitterness, though you’ll also remove some of the vitamins. For a salad, you can chop the leaves into small pieces, mix them with other greens, and top with a dressing. The leaves can also be dried to make tea. You can also harvest the lowest part of the stem, just above the root and boil it or saute it with other vegetables. The taproot is also edible.

The flowers are one of the tastiest parts of the dandelion! You can eat them raw, use them as a garnish, or sprinkle the petals over a salad.

You can also cook them, or make wine, soup, or syrup. Just make sure to remove all the green parts as they can be bitter. The young buds can also be eaten raw, steamed, fried, or pickled. The closest look alike is a plant called hairy cat’s ear, or false dandelion (Hypochaeris radicata). It’s another very common weed, and you can use it in just about the same ways as dandelion.

This is only the beginning! If you want to check out some tasty dandelion recipes, just do an internet search and you’ll find hundreds of dandelion recipes to try. There are also entire cookbooks devoted to this one plant.

Lambsquarters (Chenopodium album)

Lambsquarters tastes great in a salad, and is highly nutritious.

Lambsquarters is one of the best edible weeds to know. It grows quickly, is widespread, is easy to harvest and eat, and is highly nutritious (high in protein; calcium; potassium; iron; and vitamins A, B complex, and C… more nutritious than your grocery store spinach!). It is closely related to quinoa (Chenopodium quinoa), and in the same family as spinach and beets. It is one of the most well-known weeds around the world and is actually cultivated for food in some countries. Two key identification characteristics of lambsquarters are a white coating on the leaf undersides and the plant is NOT hairy (unlike hairy nightshade, which is hairy, not edible, and slightly toxic). As with most plants, the best time to eat lambsquarters is in the spring when you can eat the young shoots along with all the leaves. They can be eaten raw or cooked, just like spinach. Later in the season, the stems get a bit tough, though you can still eat the leaves and the top portions of the stem. You can cook the upper stems just like you would asparagus, but make sure to harvest them before they get too fibrous. The flowers are edible, but not very tasty. The seeds, while a bit difficult to collect, are delicious and can be dried, cooked and eaten whole or ground into flour.

Common mallow (Malva neglecta)

You can use mallow to make a tasty, thick soup

Mallow fruits can be a tasty snack, eaten right off the plant

While this is not the plant that marshmallows were originally derived from (that would be the marsh mallow plant, Althea officinalis, the plant we see around here is typically common mallow), it is related and has many similar properties that make it a fun and nutritious plant. Mallow usually grows low to the ground, though it can sometimes grow 4 or 5 feet tall. Its leaves are shallowly lobed, circular, and slightly hairy with a ruffled appearance. The flowers can be white to pinkish, but are sometimes lavender or blue and the petals have a notch at the tip. The fruits are small, green flattened disks that look a bit like tiny cheese wheels (some people call mallow “cheeseweed”).

The leaves have a mild flavor and can be eaten raw in salads or sandwiches. The little fruits can also be snacked on raw, somewhat like a pea. However, the coolest edible feature of mallow shows up when you cook it. When you cook the leaves, stems, roots, and fruits they become gooey and slimy. Now, “slimy” may not sound appealing, but it means mallow can be used as an excellent (and tasty!) soup thickener or egg-like binder. Larger mallow leaves can also be used like grape leaves, and are sometimes used that way in the Mediterranean. The older leaves can be a bit tough for a salad, but grind them up and they’ll make a nutritious green to add to your smoothies.

Eat the leaves raw or steep them into tea

Sheep sorrel (Rumex acetosella)

Sheep sorrel is a very common, widespread weed in the buckwheat family. In fact, it is so widespread that it can be found in 70 countries around the world! However many people don’t notice it as it is somewhat inconspicuous. The uniquely shaped leaves are shaped a bit like a dagger that get narrower and longer as the plant matures. The leaves contain oxalic acid, which give them a delightfully tasty, sour-apple flavor. They are also full of vitamin C. Unlike the dandelion, the leaves don’t have a bitter taste and can be eaten anytime you find them. Harvesting leaves is easiest before bolting, because the leaves get more spread out and narrow. The leaves can be used in salads or soups, sauteed with other vegetables, made into a pesto, mixed into a cold drink, or steeped into a tasty tea.

More Edible Weeds to Check Out

We listed a few more plants below to give you more ideas and starting points. Please do your research before eating any wild plants! There are entire books written on the topic of edible weeds, and thousands of websites, and we can barely scratch the surface in this short post.

• Blackberry- (Himalayan-Rubus armeniacus and Cutleaf- laciniatus)- This one is not new to most people. The berries are super tasty in  jam or pie!
• Burdock (Arctium minus)- You can eat the deep taproot after you cook it. Plants that are less than one year old are the tastiest.
• Chickweed (Stellaria media)- The leaves can be eaten raw in salads, or used as an herb in soups
• Curly dock (Rumex crispus)- Eat the young green leaves after cooking them, or try grinding the seeds into flour.
• English plantain (Plantago lanceolata or major)- The older leaves are best when cooked, but you can eat the young leaves raw.
• Garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata)- A very invasive plant! Harvest the whole plant to keep it from spreading uncontrollably (it will grow back if you don’t get all of it). You can eat the stems and leaves. It is quite bitter so you’ll want to either eat small quantities or cook it.
• Green amaranth (Amaranthus retroflexus)- You can eat young shoots and leaves either raw or cooked. The older leaves require more cooking.
• Hairy bittercress (Cardamine hirsuta)- It looks very similar to the native Western bittercress, Cardamine oligosperma. For both species, you can eat the flowers, stems, leaves, and seed pods either cooked or raw. However, the leaves are the best; they add a peppery bite to salads.
• Hairy cat’s ear (Hypochaeris radicata)- Also called false dandelion, it can be eaten in ways similar to the dandelion.
• Knotweed (Fallopia japonica, F. x bohemica, F. sachalinensis)-  It is one of the world’s weeds! You can eat the young shoots after peeling off the outer skin.
• Mustard (Field mustard- Brassica rapa)- It is highly nutritious! The young leaves can be eaten raw, while the older leaves should be cooked, kind of like spinach. The root can be eaten too.
• Nipplewort- (Lapsana communis)- The young leaves can be used in a salad, or cooked and eaten like spinach. They can be a bit bitter, but you can cook them to remove the bitterness. You can also eat the upper portions of the flowering stalk.
• Purslane (Portulaca oleracea)- This is a good plant to know as it is very nutritious and everything is edible except the root.  You can eat it raw, cooked, or pickled. The leaves and shoots are tastiest when they are young. Don’t confuse it with prostrate spurge which has hairy stems and milky sap (and like other spurges, the sap is somewhat toxic)
• Sow thistles (Sonchus asper, S. oleraceus, S. arvensis)- Use the young leaves either cooked or in a salad, and cook the upper young stems.
• Spearmint (Mentha spicata) and Peppermint (Mentha x piperita)- These are the non-native species that are often cultivated, but they often escape and are quite weedy. You can use the fresh leaves in cold drinks or on a salad, while the dried leaves are great in teas
• Wild asparagus (Asparagus officinalis)- This plant escaped cultivation. Use it just like you would the asparagus that grows in a garden.
• Yellow rocket or winter cress (Barbarea vulgaris)- These leaves can be eaten year round, though the leaves are better in the spring. The buds can be eaten like broccoli. Boil the leaves and buds for a few minutes to remove the bitterness.

References:

Harris, Ben Charles. Eat the Weeds, 2^nd ed., Keats Pub, 1995.

Kallas Ph.D, John. Edible Wild Plants: Wild Foods from Dirt to Plate. Gibbs Smith, 2010.

Benoliel, Doug. Northwest Foraging: The Classic Guide to Edible Plants of the Pacific Northwest. Skipstone, 2011.

Brill, Steve. “Wild Plants.” Wildman Steve Brill, www.wildmanstevebrill.com.  Accessed January 29 2020.

Online Resources to check out:

Green Deane is a foraging expert in Florida, and has been foraging for over 60 years.

Wildman Steve Brill is a foraging expert in New York..

Patterson Clark is an invasive plant harvester and artist. He uses invasive plant materials to make art, making his own dyes (green dye from English ivy!), paper, and printing blocks with invasive plant materials from his local area. Here’s an article about his work.

Eat the Invaders: Fighting invasive species, one bite at a time.

Inasivore: “Invasive species on your mind and on your plate”

There are also lots of foraging classes and workshops in the area, which you can easily find with an Internet search.