Stinging nettle

[Eugen]

As you'all know Spring is the season for stinging nettle, and I went to great lengths to establish a little patch on a side of the property. Very rarely found in these parts of Ontario, so I bought seeds online and it took about 3 years to get this patch going.

I'm sharing with you my favourite way of eating it, which is very similar to my favourite way of eating spinach. Here's the recipe. You can change the ingredient quantities accordingly if you want to cook more or less. Note that the nettle stings, so you need to harvest with a garden glove. Best to harvest in the Spring when it's less than 8" high, so it's not stringy and hard.

* 1 lb fresh stinging nettle
* 1.5 ounce flour
* 1.5 ounce butter
* 1/2 quart milk
* 1 or 2 cloves of garlic
* 1 or 2 spoons of sour cream
* salt to taste

Procedure: using rubber gloves, wash the nettle in a large bowl with cold water. Just bathe and throw the water a few times. In a large pot boil about 2" of water from the bottom and drop the nettle in the boiling water just to parch them. As soon as they get soft and that dark green put them through a strainer and let sit on the strainer for a few minutes. Then put the nettle in a smaller pot with about 1.5 ounces of milk and blend with a hand blender.

The sauce is prepared separately. On a pan melt the butter together with the flour on medium heat, and keep steering for about a minute. Careful not to burn the sauce, adjust heat accordingly. Add the rest of the milk slowly while stirring constantly. This is done similarly to a bechamel sauce. Reduce heat and stir for another 4 minutes or so. Add the blended nettle and mix in for about another minute. At the end take off the heat and mix in two spoons of sour cream and the garlic crushed.

Serve with sunny side up eggs. That's my favourite. The flavour is different than anything else I have ever tasted, but good, and amazingly rich in vitamins and minerals.

The eggs are from the chickens of Mr Dave. Not sure if they wore their helmets or not, but they make the best eggs ever!

[RoamingGnome]

@Eugen - That looks like a very tasty combination
I've never encountered stinging nettles - either in the wild or on a plate, your made me hungry though - definitely on my bucket list of things to try now...

[propane1]

I’ve never heard of stinging nettle, not unless you mentioned it last year.

Noel

[myerslawnandgarden]

I wish I could send you some of mine; here in Illinois it is an invasive weed to is the first to take over any neglected land. And yes, you don't want to brush up against it with bare legs or arms. Until it was mentioned on this forum last year, I had never heard of anyone eating it. But many undesirable plants have medicinal properties in the roots, leaves, etc. Recently found that people in the area cook the roots of the burdock plant (which is also plentiful here), who would have thought? Don't know if it grows everywhere, but that's the plant with the nasty cockleburs that get stuck to your clothes come from.

Bob

[propane1]

I wish I could send you some of mine; here in Illinois it is an invasive weed to is the first to take over any neglected land. And yes, you don't want to brush up against it with bare legs or arms. Until it was mentioned on this forum last year, I had never heard of anyone eating it. But many undesirable plants have medicinal properties in the roots, leaves, etc. Recently found that people in the area cook the roots of the burdock plant (which is also plentiful here), who would have thought? Don't know if it grows everywhere, but that's the plant with the nasty cockleburs that get stuck to your clothes come from.

Bob

Yep, have those burdock plants/weeds/nuisance things here. But I’m not a, a cooking burdock roots and eating them. No way.

Noel

[Eugen]

@myerslawnandgarden Bob, so you don't need I send you any seeds eh?

I have tried burdock root. Not tasty. The nettle on the other hand is tastier than spinach. For me at least. Don't forget guys list of you have roots in Europe, and nettle was staple in the old days.

@RoamingGnome I like fiddle heads a lot too. Great idea to grow it in the forest next to us. How do I start it?

[JSinMO]

I remember the conversation on this last year. I wasn’t sure what the plant was. Now I know and I’m with Bob, you can have it all from here! I remember going through patches of that stuff in the woods when I was a kid. The sting is quite annoying!

I might try it though, if someone around here knew how to cook it like you. If I try I probably would wind up with a stung tongue!

[RoamingGnome]

@RoamingGnome I like fiddle heads a lot too. Great idea to grow it in the forest next to us. How do I start it?

Did some Googling - http://fiddleheadnursery.ca/ they are in Kimberley - near Collingwood and mentioned Asparagus, Stinging Nettles, and Ostrich Ferns (fiddleheads) on their web page

Also - https://www.thespruce.com/how-to-grow-o ... ns-2539638 there were lots of good articles on growing the ferns that produce fiddleheads in the springtime - Important to note that not all wild ferns have edible fronds - some are poisonous - kinda like foraging for mushrooms in the forest - better be 110% certain of what you are picking before it ends up in the cooking pot.

Even though we only have 10 acres there is a good variety of growing conditions - everything from an old beaver meadow with a creek running through it to the forested hillside - it's sandy rocky soil though, it will need a bit of help to be productive - any digging I've done had 3-4 inches of soil/leaf litter and roots, below that was all glacial sand + gravel...

[Gordy]

If I try I probably would wind up with a stung tongue!

Just don't nibble on it raw like you do while picking garden produce. NO sting to it once cooked


Gordy

[ckainMich]

I have been told that the juice in a Burdock leaf will 'cool' Nettle sting very quickly ???