Here are scans of two articles I wrote published in 2004 (in Norwegian) in Våre Nyttevekster. The first one is about great edible salt tolerant plants (halophytes) such as Tripolium vulgare (syn. Aster tripolium), Sea kale (Crambe maritima) and Beta maritima (sea beet), articles that were later expanded in my book Around the World in 80 plants!
For various reasons large areas of conventional agricultural land around the world are becoming too salty to grow conventional crops due to intensive cultivation with irrigation leading to salt build up in the soil. In places like the Netherlands coastal agricultural land is impacted by salt water from the sea. One can either try to breed increased resistence to salt in conventional crops or develop non-conventional crops based on wild species that naturally tolerate high levels of salt, so-called halophytes.
It would be a great project to select Sonchus oleraceus…for new improved yielding and special forms like was done with wild chicory aIt would be a great project to select Sonchus oleraceus…for new improved yielding and special forms like was done with wild chicory and other vegetables… Last winter somebody found seed of an amazing frilly sow thistle being sold in an on-line chinese vegetabe catalogue….too good to be true…I should have noticed that the seed weren’t Sonchus when I sowed them…it seems it’s just an endive :( Lost in translation?
The seed packet….The resulting plant.The flower stemI had seed left from the Chinese packet (right) and compared with common sow thistle seed collected in my garden…
Why is it that black raspberries (Rubus occidentalis) aren’t more grown in Europe? They started ripening two weeks earlier than last year, see http://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=2368
During the garden tour at the weekend everyone was offered a taste and all seemed to be impressed…I told them not to swallow but save the seed and stratify, so perhaps they will start becoming more popular…
Added a picture at the bottom of the almost thorn free stems, unlike the very thorny wild species!
From top left and clockwise: Medicago radiata, Medicago scutellata “Sava” and Scorpiurus spp. (picture from my garden on 31st July 2004)Chorogi or chinese artichokes (Stachys affinis)
I read some 15 years ago (but would love a proper reference*) that the Victorians (and some more recent jokers too) were fond of practical jokes and would add various plant parts that resembled caterpillars, snails, worms etc to their salads. I call them collectively joke plants. I should grow them again…I love humour in the garden :)
Scorpiurus muricatus and S. vermiculatus (Prickly caterpillars, prickly scorpionstail / skorpionurt), Medicago scutellata “Sava” (snail medick), Medicago radiata (ray-podded medick) and chorogi or chinese artichoke (Stachys affinis) are examples. Pictures below (yes, I’ve grown them and smuggled them into my salads for the entertainment of unsuspecting visitors!)
*I find the following reference in Google Books: A Joy of Gardening by Victoria Sackville-West (Harper, 1958). On pages 184-186, there’s a section called “Joke plants” which I’d love to get hold of! Anyone have this book?
Add 050916: Thanks to Alison Tindale who mentioned joke plants in her great blog The Backyard Larder having seen a reference in the classic book by Fearing Burr “The Field and Garden Vegetables of America Containing Full Descriptions of Nearly Eleven Hundred Species and Varietes; With Directions for Propagation,Culture and Use” (1863). See http://backyardlarder.blogspot.hu/2013/06/rhubarb-vegetable.html (at the bottom)
Lovely bunch of people on the two tours of my garden today! Forgot to take any pictures during the first tour, so just a couple from the second during the only shower…it had threatened to be a very wet afternoon this morning!!
050916: Added some pictures taken during the first tour by Elin Anita Mosbakk. Thank you!
Tour two in my rain forest garden!
In my rain forest garden…I’m sheltering under my giant Udo!
Quinoa “Stephe” will soon be ripe!
Alexander garlic grown as a wild plant!
Runner beans / stangbønner are now appearing after a long time in flower
Grape climbing into my yew / barlind
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour).
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour).
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour).
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour).
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour).
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour).
Fotograf: Elin Anita Mosbakk (from the first tour). Broad beans intertwined with Hablitzia!
A couple of weeks ago, I finally got round to inviting botanist Kamal Acharya and his wife Sharmila Phuyal to see my garden!! They were amazed to see so many plants that they were familiar with from home and I blogged about this here:
They asked (begged?) couldn’t we come and make you a Nepalese meal with plants from your garden! I just had to find time for this and I’m very glad I did as it was a fantstic meal. Yes, I’m a very lucky man!!
Sharmila about to prepare fresh Jimmu for the very first time. Living in the lowlands, they can only get it dried…
Sharmila gets acquainted with the Nepalese onion in Malvik…still a bit in disbelief that this is really happening!
Another plant my new friends recognised was taro (karkalo) or Colocasia esculenta. I’ve grown this as a pot plant for several years for a couple of tubers a year, inside in winter and outside for most of the summer. Even in our cold climate it grows outside in summer! However, I’d never used the leaves as I thought one had to use special low-oxalate varieties (oxalate in the leaves can scratch your throat). They assured me I could eat it!
Sharmila can’t get karkalo leaf in Trondheim and , so it was amazing for them to meet someone up in the north actually growing it! They will now grow it themselves!
Meanwhile, Britt-Arnhild and helper made the salad (NB! Salads aren’t very common in Nepal, perhaps cooking to sterilise).
What a lucky man I am!!!
Britt-Arnild’s picture from the kitchen
A quick fry of the Jimmu (Allium wallichii) before adding to the black lentils/dal..
The karkalo leaf stems were first split lengthwise
The taro leaf was rolled up before cooking…Sharmila and Kamal had different ways of doing this from their different villages.
A Nepalese spice colelction including cumin and fenugreek
Cutting the taro leaf
The next generation of edimental salad makers! She decorated it herself!!
“We use the broad bean pods too” Kamal told me!!! What? Really? Isn’t it very fibrous?
Preparing the broad beans for cooking
The red coloured variety is Karmazyn
The Nepalese pressure cooker was frequently used!
Ghee (clarified butter) is important in Nepalese cooking as it is in India. They sometimes make their own, but this was bought..
Kamal showing one of the spices used…Zanthoxylum armatum, a new species for my life list!!
Cooking the taro leaf
WOW, are you jealous? The Allium wallichii flowers was a last minute finishing touch…I sacrificed my only dark flowered Jimmu for this picture! The broad beans were a bit fibrous but very tasty…. I will certainly be using the pods of broad beans in future. As Kamal said ” what’s a bit of fibre…it’s good for us!”
Nepal in Malvik edimentalised with the flowers of two varieties of Allium wallichii from high elevations in Nepal, but feeling quite at home in the lowlands of Malvik! The cooked taro was delicious and I will have to start growing more pots of taro as it makes an excellent winter house plant green! I couldn’t sense any silicates in my throat either!
Thanks to Lieven David for attracting my attention to the following interesting paper on “Wild Allium species (Alliaceae) used in folk medicine of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan” https://ethnobiomed.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/1746-4269-2-18 I was particularly interested to read of the use of the young leaves of Allium rosenbachianum, a species commonly sold as an ornamental. I’ve been growing a white flowered form for a few years, but hadn’t come across its traditional use before!
The young fresh or dried leaves are used of A. rosenbachianum and closely related A. rosenorum for the national soup dishes ‘atolla’ and ‘oshi sioalaf’.
Strap-like leaves in spring
An orange tip butterfly on the emerging inflorescence
An orange tip butterfly on the emerging inflorescence
Emerging flowers
In full flower
Young blanched early spring leaves
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
