Tag Archives: soba

A Taste of Myoga

After many years trying, I finally had a taste of home grown myoga or Japanese ginger (Zingiber mioga) this week!
I think it was in the garden of my friend Frank van Keirsbilck (of http://www.thevegetablegarden.be) in Belgium that I  first saw this plant. I bought a plant from Edulis nursery in the UK in 2010 and planted it in my garden, hoping it would be hardy enough. It survived for 3 years, but grew weakly and emerged in the spring later and later every year, before disappearing for good. Determined to have a taste, Frank sent me a starter in 2016 and, now, 4 years on my pot grown plant kept indoors in a cold bedroom all year finally produced a flower bud, the main part eaten. We made a Japanese style soba (buckwheat pasta) dish to which the shredded myoga was added! A very pleasant mild ginger taste, making it all worthwhile. I will now move it to a larger pot.

Soba with stir-fried Golpared veggies

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The veggies: Allium senescens x nutans hybrid onions, Malva moschata (musk mallow), Broad bean tops, Atriplex hortensis “Rubra” (red orach), Sonchus oleraceus (common sow thistle), chili, puff balls, Leccinum versipelle (orange birch bolete / rødskrubb), piggsopp/hedgehog fungus and at the top young parsnip roots (thinnings)

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Heracleum maximum is the North American Cow Parsnip…

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Heracleum maximum is the North American Cow Parsnip…

I made soba with stir-fried golpared veggies and wild fungi for tonight’s dinner. Soba is buckwheat noodles. Golpar is the Turkish spice usually made from the ground seed of Heracleum persicum (Tromsøpalme). To me the taste of “golpar” made with different Heracleum species isn’t very different. Tonight I used Heracleum maximum seeds fresh harvested from the garden to spice the stir-fry (instead of cumin which I used to use).

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Harvested cow parsnip seed heads

 

 

 

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Harvested cow parsnip seed heads

 

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Cow parsnip seed

 

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Ground cow parsnip seed

 

Norwegian sansai

Good to be back from Japan to Norwegian sansai (foraged vegetables)….
From top left, left to right: Angelica archangelica “Vossakvann”, various dandelions / løvetann (Taraxacum), Rumex patientia (patience dock/hagesyre), Garlic bulbil shoots (forced indoors), ground elder / skvallerkål, Rheum palmatum (petiole), Rumex acetosa (sorrel / engsyre), Myrrhis odorata (with root ; sweet cicely / spansk kjørvel), chervil / hagekjørvel, Campanula latifolia (giant bellflower / storklokke), horseradish / pepperrot ( shoot), Anredera cordifolia (Madeira vine; grown inside), Alliaria petiolata ( garlic mustard / løkurt), Hemerocallis (daylily/daglilje), Ranunculus ficaria (lesser celandine / vårkål), Urtica dioica (nettle / nesle), Allium senescens x nutans, Hablitzia tamnoides (Hablitzia, Caucasian spinach / stjernemelde)…made into a stir fry with soba (buckwheat pasta)

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