Wild greens.

Bitter, sweet and savory.

Welcome to the Art of Growing Food newsletter. I write about artful growing tips for cooks who love to garden. You are receiving this newsletter because you are a free or paid subscriber. Thank you! - Ellen Ecker Ogden

“It is spring again. The earth is like a child that knows poems by heart.”

―Rainer Maria Rilke

Hello Everyone.

All week, I’ve been on my hands and knees weeding. It’s how I spend most of April, and now into May. I wish it were different, but weeds will quickly run to seeds if I don’t catch them now. Every weed can easily disperse ten thousand plants during a single growing season. That’s enough to keep me bent over all summer.

Like most gardeners, I question what is a weed and what deserves to stay in place. It’s a process of editing. After all, aren’t all gardens a way to tame the wild, and keep a healthy balance between people and nature? Weeds are real and opportunistic, spreading through underground roots. Even the birds are culprits, eating seeds that drop everywhere. I curse the time I spend on this thankless task each spring, yet lately, my rules around a weed-free garden have relaxed. Why am I working so hard to undo nature?

As soon as I rid the garden of one type of weed, another species appears. However, I have noticed how each weed has its season and this abundance has shifted my thinking to learn more about these weeds, identify them by name, and get to know their habits. But mostly to learn if they taste good. Lately, I’ve been tasting a lot of weeds,

I can proudly list a dozen or more of the weeds by name and sum up their virtues: chickweed, purslane, dandelion, and sorrel are appearing right now. As a food group, they cover the bitter, savory, and sweet notes I might add to a salad. As a source of nutrition, nothing I grow in my garden can rival their high marks for health benefits. It’s nature’s bounty that we often ignore, in favor of a supplement.

When my kids were young, I taught them about plantain, also known as the white man’s footprint because it grows along well-worn pathways. It can be eaten in a salad, or boiled, but it is also universally used to take the sting out of a bee sting. Chew on the leaves as if they were chewing gum to make a poultice, then layer it on the spot. It cools and soothes, yet is also a distraction from the pain,

This simple remedy I learned in a yearlong apprenticeship with an herbalist, where I also learned to make healing salves, and tinctures from weeds. Every part of the plant is used, from flowers, and leaves to roots. This led to learning plant science medicine, a way of tapping into the plant for healing, without harvesting. Herbalism is more preventative than a cure, yet it is all useful information to know. During this year, I also gathered weeds to eat raw in a salad, yet I find most wild greens unbearably bitter.

At one time, eating for health was my goal, but now I prefer to find a way to balance with the pure pleasure of taste. I’ve learned to adapt recipes to include as many greens, both wild and cultivated because I still believe they are the greatest source of nutrition to keep our bodies running at optimal capacity. One of the recipes I make all summer is an arugula, couscous, and lentil salad, dressed with a lemony vinaigrette and then tossed with feta cheese and tomatoes. I make it in the morning and leave it in the refrigerator to marinate all day, adding the greens just before serving.

Arugula, Couscous and Lentil Salad. Recipe from The New Heirloom Garden.

When I make this salad with its many seasonal variations, it has changed how I think about weeds, because when I add grains it tempers the bitter bite. The grain can be quinoa, bulger, farro, or rice, anything easy and quick to cook, dressed in a lemony vinaigrette and cooled before adding the greens. Knowing that I will savor at least a few of the weeds I am editing, makes the whole painful process a little better. And keeps me thinking about dinner.

My garden style has changed over the years, hovering halfway between maintaining a tidy garden and allowing the edges to go wild. As with my cooking, I’ve learned that enjoyment is an equally important element of good health. With one foot in the garden and the other in the kitchen, it’s back to weeding.

From my garden to yours,

Ellen O.

Ellen Ecker Ogden is a Vermont-based food and garden writer, and author of five books on garden designs with recipes. She is at work writing a new book, Love & Arugula, and planting her kitchen garden. Instragram @ogdenellen

The Salad Garden. In my book, The Complete Kitchen Garden.