Rob: Hey everyone, I am here with my friend, Eric.
We met two years ago in Florida, and I was
blown away by his knowledge of the plants
that he has been foraging for about a decade.
He is a plant wizard with really seemingly
infinite knowledge.
I know there are things that he does not
know, but it seems like he knows pretty
much every plant that we cross.
I have been blessed to get to learn from him.
I've been with him for the last day in
Maryland and have learned so much.
I am excited that he is going to share
some of his favorite plants to help you
get foraging, and first he is going to
introduce himself a bit.
Eric: My name is Eric, I am a plant-lover.
permaculturist, and an avid forager,
and I am just really grateful to be here
with you all today and share my top ten
wild edible greens for the mid Atlantic.
There is such an abundance of food in
these fields and forests, so let us go
see what we can find!
(Music playing)
My number one all time favorite wild
edible green has to be Urtica dioica, or
the mighty stinging nettle.
There is a native North American species
as well, Urtica gracilis, and also Laportea canadensis.
I love it for so many reasons, it offers
all kinds of amazing medicine, its flavor
is incredible, it can be absolutely
prolific in the wild, and it is very easy
to cultivate for those of us that are gardeners.
Not to mention that it will grow in full
shade underneath black walnuts for the
permaculturists out there.
It can be made into dried green powders or
blended up into pesto, or it can also be
steamed and sautéed.
Any kind of heat will deactivate the
stinging hairs and make it edible.
Definitely my number one all time favorite
has to be stinging nettle.
Number 2 on my list of wild edible greens
has got to be chickweed.
This is another great friend to really
connect with and bring in to the kitchen.
This is Stellaria media, the common name is chickweed.
I love this one because it is pretty easy
to identify, it has these really cute
little star shaped flowers on it, and
opposite leaves.
It is really cool and juicy and the flavor
is really awesome.
It is one that I do like to cook because
it is a little higher in the oxalic acid
department. but it also makes a great
pesto and can be dried into powders.
I would definitely say that number 2 on
the list is chickweed.
Keep an eye out for this one in the spring and fall.
It will disappear in the summer.
Number 3 on my list is lambsquarters.
This is one of the first friends that I
really got tuned into when I was first
starting to eat something wild every day.
The Latin name is Chenopodium album, and
is just an absolute super star from the spinach family.
It is one of the most nutritious plants on earth.
It is also one of the highest wild greens
in oxalic acid.
This is one that I definitely like to cook
up, I like to steam it, boil it, pan fry
it, anything to help cook out and denature those oxalates.
But after that, it is an absolutely flavor
packed, incredible edible.
This is one that should be in all of the
4 star restaurants, and it should
definitely be on everyone's plate.
So, Chenopodium album. Lambsquarters.
Number 3.
Number 4 on my list is definitely
dandelions, Taraxacum officinale.
This is one that most everybody is
probably already familiar with.
It is an absolute incredible edible.
The leaves are great in salad, but they
can also be boiled to remove some of the
bitterness if you are not into that.
They are loaded with all kinds of
nutrients, tons of vitamin A, and they are
the second highest source of boron of any
of the wild greens, which is cool because
boron helps to detoxify the body of fluoride.
It is definitely an important one for us
to bring into our diets, and it is also a
great one for helping to support the
liver health, and helping our body to
detoxify in multiple different ways.
Dandelion is definitely one for everybody
to tune into, and bring home to the dinner plate.
Coming in at number 5 is Alliaria
petiolata, the garlic mustard.
So this is a biennial plant in the
brassicaceae family, the mustard family.
Like the first 4 on our list, it is a
European import that is very weedy and prolific.
This one in fact is allelopathic, so it
competes against other plants in the area.
For that reason I really love encouraging
people to consume these kinds of plants
that are exotic to our region, so that we
can help native habitats to thrive a
little bit more, take some of the
pressure off of the native plants in that way.
This one was brought over from Europe
because it is very highly nutritious.
There are 190 milligrams of vitamin C
per a 100 gram serving, which is very easy
to consume in a batch of pesto.
That is definitely one of my favorite ways
to bring garlic mustard into the kitchen
is in pesto form.
It also makes a great cooked green,
sautéed or even steamed up, or you can
boil it when it gets older to take some of
the bitterness out.
Definitely number 5 on the list, is Alliaria petiolata.
Garlic mustard.
Number 6 on our list is basswood.
This is the American basswood, Tilia americana.
This is a native tree in the mallow family.
I love this one because we do not get to
eat a whole lot of tree leaves and this
one is so mild and has such a nice flavor
that it can actually be the basis for a salad.
I love greens that we can eat raw.
It also makes an excellent green powder,
makes a fantastic sautéed greens, steamed,
anyway that you prepare it, basswood is absolutely incredible.
And the leaves also have this nice kind
of mucilaginous quality to it that I think
really helps to keep us hydrated in the
summer time, and also makes for a
wonderful tea when we have got a sore throat.
Definitely number 6 on the list is
basswood, Tilia americana.
For number 7 on our list we have another
tree leaf, and this is one that I bet a
lot of you are already familiar with
because it is world famous for its berries.
And of course we are talking about the mighty mulberry.
In the mid Atlantic, that would be either
Morus alba, which is the Asian species, or
Morus rubra, which is the native one.
They both have edible leaves.
There is an introduced species,
Broussonetia papyrifera, that is a
lookalike that is worth looking into, it
is called the paper mulberry and it is in
the same family but not as edible.
This one is not as ... some of them are
acceptable as a salad crop but more so I
think of mulberries as being great for
green powders or cooked greens, either
steamed, sautéed, or otherwise kind of
cooked down a little bit.
Yeah, I love mulberries because they are
so easy to identify and they are so
prolific, and they have these deep roots.
They are just beautiful, amazing, awesome trees.
Number 7 is the mighty mulberry.
Morus alba, Morus rubra.
Coming in at number 8 on our list is
purslane, Portulaca oleracea.
This is a really great cooking green.
It can also be added raw to salads, the
flavor is great.
It is kind of high in oxalic acid so I do
prefer to cook it myself personally, but I
have heard of people adding it to smoothies.
It has got a little bit of a sliminess to
it that adds a great mucilaginous kind of
throat coating quality to it.
One of the other things that is amazing
about this plant is its remarkably high
omega-3 fat content.
This is a great source of omega-3 fats
from a local, wild, plant based source.
Definitely let us say number 8 is
Portulaca oleracea, purslane.
Number 9 on our list is Asclepias syriaca.
This is a native perennial that grows in
open fields all throughout the country.
This one is absolutely, incredibly delicious.
It is important to boil this one twice
because it does have cardiac glycosides
known as cardenolides in it that are pretty toxic.
So I like to boil it in 2 changes of water.
Another thing to be aware of with this
plant is that it looks very similar to
another native that is poisonous and that is dogbane.
This is the dogbane right here and you
can see that they obviously grow in the
exact same habitat and so superficially
it can be difficult to tell the two of
them apart, but when you get into the
core of it you can see that the inside of
the milkweed is hollow, where the inside
of the dogbane is solid.
And so that is a very key distinguishing
feature that makes it easy to tell the two apart.
Asclepias syriaca, number 9.
Coming in at number 10 on our list is the mighty Bidens.
Beggar's ticks, Spanish needles, and with
this one we will go ahead and say the entire genus.
As far as I know, every species is edible.
Some are definitely better than others I have noticed.
This one in particular is Bidens frondosa,
and this one is a great weedy summer superstar.
It is in the aster family and has a little
bit of a kind of bitter sappiness to it so
I do prefer to either boil or steam it
before using it for pesto, but an
absolutely incredible cooking green.
It is loaded with nutrition and also has
a medicinal component to it as well being
very popular as a gentle but effective antibiotic.
The common names beggars ticks and Spanish
needles are a reference to the seed, and
that make these very easy to identify, and
you will see these all over the place
once you start looking for them.
Number 10, Bidens.
Thank you so much for taking the time to
get to know my top 10 wild edibles for the mid atlantic.
I wanted to give a special shout out to
definitely Rob Greenfield and your team.
Thank you so much.
I definitely want to give a lot of love
to the folks at Meta Creative for helping
me with all of this filming and putting
together all of the shots and scenes and
just making this whole process so much
more approachable for me.
Thank you for your help and patience.
I wanted to give thanks to The REED Center
in Middletown, Maryland,
Chesapeake Bounty in Saint Leonard,
Maryland, and Plant Path Nursery in
Knoxville, Maryland for hosting some of
these video segments.
Thank you so much. Peace!
Rob: I hope you got a lot out of this
video and can now implement these things
into your life.
Eric is a plant educator, an earth lover,
and a permaculturist with so much
knowledge to share with us.
Check the links in this description to follow him.
And make sure to subscribe to this channel
there are many more inspirational and
educational videos to come.
I love you all very much, and I will see
you all again real soon.
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