On my way back from the Future Heirloom event in Copenhagen, I had a few hours between trains to visit one of my favourite Botanical gardens in Gothenburg, Sweden, Göteborgs botaniska trädgård. Apart from a very short visit on my way to Austria and the UK by train in January 2020, the last time I had visited was on 30th August 2017 when I did an edibles walk and talk with my friend Bosse Blomquist (see https://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=13658). Afterwards, I did two talks (as the first was sold out) and even got to stay the night in the flat in the gardens! Thanks again to Johan Nilson for showing me around behind the scenes and telling me about the big changes happening at the gardens with new glasshouses being built where the old ones had been! Below are pictures of edible plants I spotted in the gardens during my latest visit:
The garden entrance: easily accessible by tram from the railway station
Sorbus ulleungensis: this endemic to Ulleung-do Island between Korea and Japan. It has large quite sweet berries. I hadn’t noticed that there was a row of this species planted next to the garden entrance! The garden had collected this and other species from an exhibition there (see my article on Dystaenia takesimana here: https://www.edimentals.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Dystaenia_fin-3.pdf)
Sorbus ulleungensis: this endemic to Ulleung-do Island between Korea and Japan. It has large quite sweet berries. I hadn’t noticed that there was a row of this species planted next to the garden entrance! The garden had collected this and other species from an exhibition there (see my article on Dystaenia takesimana here: https://www.edimentals.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Dystaenia_fin-3.pdf)
Rubus parviflorus (labelled as Rubus nutkanus), the Western Thimbleberry; I planted this at the Væres Venners Community Garden this summer.
Allium scabriscapum in the bulb house is a beautiful yellow flowered species.
Umbilicus tropaeolifolius in the bulb house
Allium oschaninii is a crop near relative to Allium cepa and was traditionally wild foraged
Beautiful autumn foliage of Hosta “Harry van Trier”
Rubus palmatus is wild foraged in Japan
Rubus palmatus is wild foraged in Japan
A decent sized Toona sinensis (Chinese mahogany, Chinese cedar, Chinese toon, beef and onion plant or red toon) is widely cultivated in the Far East for its young shoots which have an oniony taste due to the presence of organosulfur compounds; a popular tree in permaculture / forest gardening (I didn’t see any shoots coming up around the tree)
A decent sized Toona sinensis (Chinese mahogany, Chinese cedar, Chinese toon, beef and onion plant or red toon) is widely cultivated in the Far East for its young shoots which have an oniony taste due to the presence of organosulfur compounds; a popular tree in permaculture / forest gardening.
Vitis coignetiae
Corylus fargesii (Chinese Hazel) has a tree form like Turkish Hazel.
PInus armandii var mastersiana is the Taiwanese form of Chinese White Pine, one of the sources of commercial pine nuts.
Elaeagnus sp., autumn olive
Smilax china (see https://pfaf.org/user/plant.aspx?latinname=Smilax+china)
Eleutherococcus sp.
Gingko biloba
Asclepias exaltata (poke milkweed) has shoots resembling pokeweed, Phytolacca americana. Some species of milkweed including this one are considered edible, eaten boiled and in moderation.
Allium cernuum “Monarch White”
Rudbeckia laciniata (sochan, Cherokee greens): Samuel Thayer recommends in particular the autumn broader and blunter leaves (I’ve never seen this in my gardens)
The wonderful rock garden area (Klippträdgården) is my favourite area of the garden with many perennial vegetables I’ve not seen elsewhere! Plants are organised geographically.
The wonderful rock garden area (Klippträdgården) is my favourite area of the garden with many perennial vegetables I’ve not seen elsewhere! Plants are organised geographically.
Smilax rotundifolia
Smilax glauca
Azorella prolifera
Oemleria cerasiformis, Indian plum, Osoberry: I don’t remember seeing this in other botanical gardens in Europe
One patch of spreading Allium wallichii!
Allium thunbergii or close relation
Saxifraga fortunei: my friend @aiahnoack in Denmark calls this tempura greens from its use
Saxifraga fortunei: my friend @aiahnoack in Denmark calls this tempura greens from its use
Allium ulleungense: good to see that the garden has followed the recent changes, splitting the Allium victorialis into 5 species!
Actinidia arguta
Codonopsis bomiensis from Tibet
Towards the East!
Smilax nipponica
Cephalotaxus harringtonii var nana (yew plum)
Aralia continentalis
Eleutherococcus sessiliflorus
Pinus koraiensis, an important source of pine nuts
Actinidia arguta
Vaccinium smallii, an Asian blueberry
Aralia elata (devil’s walking stick)
Aralia elata (devil’s walking stick)
Patrinia gibbosa seed (some Patrinia species are foraged for the shoots in Japan, but are a little too bitter for me)
Cephalotaxus harringtonii var nana
The Japanese Dell is my favourite area of the garden. There are some 500 species planted here and many (1/3?) are edible plants (so-called sansai)a
Gaylussacia dumosa, dwarf huckleberry
Another spreading Allium wallichii accession
Staphylea colchica is a bladder nut from the Caucasus (the young shoots are more useful )
Papaw (Asimina triloba) has, I’ve heard, produced ripe fruit in this area
I have a 20+ year old sweet chestnut (Castanea sativa) tree in my garden. I didn’t really think it would make it here, so it was planted in not the best spot in the garden. To my great surprise, it has only suffered a little frost damage at the tips in the first few years. It even survived the record cold winter in 2011 here when the entire root system would have been frozen solid for up to 4 months. Last year, I noticed both male and female flowers for the first time, but no nuts resulted. Then, I was leading a tour of the garden in September and took the participants into the lane below the garden from where there’s a good view of the chestnut, a mulberry, Chinese walnut, Carya ovata, Cornus kousa and Rhus typhina. My eyes rested on a chestnut at the top of the tree! I cried out in my excitement and did a little dance to the amusement of those present! The 20 year wait to see if chestnuts could ripen up here was perhaps over! With only one tree, I hadn’t expected this and had planted a second tree next to it, but that is also growing slowly and it will be some years before it flowers.
Last week, we had another look and it looked as though it was slightly open and looked mature (darker colour). I therefore decided to knock it down. There is thick vegetation below the tree, and despite searching I could find no chestnut….just the open husk (pictures). It was presumably not pollinated, but it does give me hope that it is possible in this area. This tree came from woodland in southern England. I’ve now planted good varieties at the community garden (Væres Venner Felleshage), so will just have to wait!
When giving talks I like to renew myself and talk about something different each time. For my talk in Copenhagen at the Future Heirloom event last weekend I focussed during part of my presentation on edimentals in the Asteraceae or Compositae (the aster or daisy family / kurvplantefamilien). These are tbe edible perennial vegetables that are most obvious in the autumn garden and often underutilised by chefs in the west. Visiting the World Garden a few days before my talk on 17th October, I gathered flowers from all the flowering Asteraceae and here they are with names:Most are used for their tasty spring shoots and leaves, used cooked and raw, and most have a characteristic fragrant taste / aroma loved in the Far East (as also Chrysanthemum tea is popular and a refreshing accompaniment to spicy dishes). Aster scaber and Ligularia fischeri are nowadays both cultivated in a big way as “sannamul” in Korea and even exported to Korean markets around the world. Young shoots of other Aster sp. are foraged in Asia as is big-leaf Aster, Aster macrophyllus, in North America. Also from North America, cutleaf coneflower Rudbeckia laciniata or sochan was a popular vegetable for the Cherokee first people and in recent years has, maybe not unsurprisingly become a commercial vegetable in Korea. Annual shungiku or chopsuey greens Glebionis coronaria hails from the Mediterranean but is today an important vegetable in the Far East! Others currently in flower are best known as root crops, including (in the picture) Jerusalem artichoke (Helianthus tuberosus) and Dahlia. Yacon (Polymnia sonchifolia) is also autumn flowering but doesn’t manage to flower here (is moved indoors to flower and bulk up). The final flower in the picture is marigold Calendula officinalis, whose culinary use includes decorating and flavouring salads, soups and other dishes. Late flowering also means that the Asteraceae are also particularly important for a range of insect pollinators like hoverflies, drone flies and bees as can be seen in the pictures below, all taken in the World Garden:
Aster scaber
Aster scaber and, behind, taller Aster yomena
Aster yomena
Ligularia fischeri
Ligularia fischeri
Ligularia fischeri
Cardoon
Ligularia fischeri
Ligularia fischeri
Dahlia
Ligularia fischeri from Himalaya is late flowering
It’s ridiculous but it’s been such a busy summer that I hadn’t found time for foraging mushrooms in the forest this year until last Saturday 12th October. We took advantage of our helper Aleksandra Domańska from Sweden / Poland to harvest the ridiculous amounts of winter chanterelles / traktkantarell Craterellus tubaeformis in the forest at the moment. The first we picked were frozen but it became warmer as the day progressed. We returned to our car pool vehicle after several hours with 24kg of fungi, mostly winter chanterelles but also with a good number chantarelles / kantarell. two types of hedgehog fungi / piggsopp, one sheep polypore / sauesopp (Albatrellus ovinus), one cep / steinsopp and a few yellowfoot / gul trompetsopp (Craterellus lutescens). Some of the pictures in the forest were taken by Cathrine Kramer from The Center of Genomic Gastronomy who has been filming my autumn activities for a couple of days.
Some of the winter chanterelles drying on the living room floor after cleaning!
Some of the winter chanterelles drying on the living room floor after cleaning!
Some of the winter chanterelles drying after cleaning!
Chantarelles / kantarell
Hedgehog fungi / piggsopp
Cep / steinsopp
Winter kantarell / traktkantarell
One giant winter chantarelle with multiple caps
The winter chantarelle with multiple caps (last picture)
Winter kantarell / traktkantarell
Chantarelles / kantarell
Prime winter kantarell / traktkantarell habitat in damp mossy spruce (gran) woodland
We met this alien in hunter proof gear and satellite dish!
Last year a garden helper, Daniil, helped me to harvest the wapato or duck potatoes (Sagittaria latifolia) which originate from the Mississippi River in Wisconsin. I grow them in a large bucket every year. There was ice on the water when Daniil harvested the tubers with his hands. This year my helper Aleksandra Domańska from Sweden / Poland was up to the task of trying to harvest them in the traditional way with her feet and bravely stepped into the muddy bucket, sinking quickly to the bottom in the only slightly warmer water than last year! She then used her hands to harvest a good crop of tubers. See the bottom of this post for links to other wapato posts. These tubers are one of the tastiest root crops! This was an experience that none of us are likely to forget, not the least Aleksa! It was also filmed by another visitor Cathrine Kramer from the Center for Genomic Gastronomy who is making a film of 4 seasons in my garden (see us all in the last picture!)
Picture by Cathrine Kramer
Muddy wapato harvest
Muddy wapato harvest
Cold muddy feet
Wapato harvest
Meg, Aleksa, Catrhine and yours truly!
LINKS: Daniil and the duck potatoes https://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=31597 Freezing Wapato and Chinese Arrowhead harvest: https://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=30703 Sam Thayer and Mississippi wapato: https://www.edimentals.com/blog/?p=30714
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
Most are used for their tasty spring shoots and leaves, used cooked and raw, and most have a characteristic fragrant taste / aroma loved in the Far East (as also Chrysanthemum tea is popular and a refreshing accompaniment to spicy dishes). 
