We’ve opened the garden many times over the last 25 years as part of Økouka (organics week) and before that as part of Økologisk Hagebrukskampanjen (the organic gardening campaign). Last night (18th September 2024) was the first of two garden tours in my Edible (Forest) Garden this week and once again a great group of folk had signed up. In addition, Beatrice from NIBIO took part to make a short film with focus on soil as part of the EU project Prepsoil. There’s still a few places left on the second tour on Saturday at 11 and there will also be a garden tour at my main focus at the moment, the Væres Venners Felleshagen (community garden) at Ranheim on Sunday at 1400 (just come along if interested). All tours are in Norwegian with English plant names if necessary.
Plant sale, perennial vegetables including many Alliums!
Toad lilies (Tricyrtis sp.) are great edientomentals from the Far East; i.e. both food for us to eat (the edi bit), eye food (the mental bit ;) ) and food for the pollinators like bumble bees (the ento bit). I’ve been meaning to try to research this genus properly for many years ever since I ate the young shoots 10 years ago (it tasted mild and good). I’ve tried 10+ species over the years, but only the early flowering species thrive (Tricyrtis latifolia is I think the most successful of the two). Bumble bees love them too as can be seen in the video below! Below the pictures is an overview of how different species Tricyrtis are used in Japan. It indicates that the flowers can also be used at least in moderation for decoration, so I must give it a go!
Tricyrtis in the kitchen All I have so far is that 6 or 7 species are listed in my comprehensive Japanese foraging book (in Japanese): Wild Food Lexicon (Japan) and this is what it says (there are no warnings of possible toxicity and it encourages the reader to get and grow a couple of the species): Tricyrtis latifolia (Tamagawa hototogisu) Eat young shoots. You can eat other types of Tricyrtis so don’t worry if you make a mistake. Rest assured. You can pick it even if the stems are long, you can pick the soft young shoots until they bloom. Boil in hot water with a pinch of salt, then rinse in cold water. In boiled food, soup, tempura… Tricyrtis macropoda It can be eaten like Tamagawa hototogisu, but the ones with a lot of hairs have an inferior taste. Tricyrtis macrantha Boiled soup. For tempura etc. It has a crisp texture. Boil briefly, soak in cold water, boil, cut into small pieces and season with mustard. The young shoots are the most flavourful amongst the hototogisu. Tricyrtis macranthopsis Seedlings for cultivation are on the market. You can grow it and use it as food. Around May, pick young shoots that grow diagonally. Even those with long stems can be eaten by picking the soft part at the tip of the stem. Tricyrtis perfoliata Young shoots are “hard”? in quality. Floating the flowers in the soup and enclosing them in jelly will make them beautiful. Get it, grow it and taste it!!
Dette var kanskje den 10. gangen Malvik Hagelag hadde vært på hagevandring hos meg, over en snart 40 års periode! Jeg meldte meg inn i hagelaget og var med på møtene fra midten av 80-tallet. Den gangen var jeg den yngste (de fleste medlemmer var pensjonister). Det var derfor interessant å reflektere over at nå hadde jeg kanskje blitt eldst! Det var en flott sommerkveld og 30C og noen meldte avbud pga temperaturen! Men, det var en fin gjeng som var med og hørte på mine bortforklaringer for hvorfor hagen hadde blitt så vill….hadde jeg mistet kontroll i mine gamle dager? Neida…..bare sluppet kontroll bevisst og overført kontrollen til mine to andre hagene på Væres Venners felleshagen og Løkhagen Chicago! Og denne gangen hadde de bestilt en salat, og det ble ca 130 forskjellige spiselige planter. Årets første jordbær og rips ble ofret og blomsterstander av gulblomstret Allium hookeri var muliense, Allium cernuum mfl. Vi avsluttet med plante- og boksalg!
Last week was National Organic Week (Økouka), a busy week for me as I had two garden tours in my Edible Garden in Malvik (the rain stopped both days just before we started), a walk and talk in the community garden at Væres Venner and a talk at Stammen Cafe & Bar in Trondheim on “Perennial Climate-friendly Food Plants for Urban Areas” talking about 15 advantages of growing perennials! Below you can see pictures from each of the events which were all well attended. I’ve credited the various photographers below. Thanks to all that came along!
1. Garden tour on Wednesday 27th September
Making the Ø letter for Økouka (picture: Margaret Anderson)
2. Talk at Stammen
2. Garden tour on Sunday 1st October
Pictures by Markus Tacker (click on the album pictures for more information):
Pictures by Marit By (click on the album pictures for more information)::
4. Walk and talk in the Væres Venner Community Garden Pictures by Marit By (the World Garden looking good in its autumn colours with the backdrop of the old ash trees):
It’s always a pleasure to spend time with students from the Fosen Folk High School from the other side of the fjord. Despite the dreadful weather, we visited all 3 of my sites – the onion garden Chicago at the Ringve Botanical Gardens followed by the Væres Venners Community Garden and, finally, my own garden The Edible Garden (this is the first time I’ve taken a group to all 3 sites!). Those that took part were two of the “lines”: The Self-sufficiency line and the The Organic Farming line (small scale). The Organic Farming line were only on the first two visits, so the picture only shows the Self-sufficiency folk!
During KVANN’s (Norwegian Seed Savers) annual meeting weekend in Trondheim we had an official opening ceremony for my garden, The Edible Garden (Den Spiselige Hagen), as a Permaculture LAND Centre, the 3rd in Norway. The official opening was fun and can be seen in the second video. Owner of Norway’s first LAND centre, Eirik Lillebøe Wiken performs the official opening from ca. 18.00 in the second video!
The videos are mostly in Norwegian!
I received my PDC after completing the course mainly taught by Jan Bang at my house in Malvik during 3 long weekends in 2017. My project report was about how I designed my own garden using permaculture design principles (without having read about them). The report can be downloaded below: