{"id":113,"date":"2016-06-01T22:45:17","date_gmt":"2016-06-02T02:45:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/?p=113"},"modified":"2016-06-07T08:38:30","modified_gmt":"2016-06-07T12:38:30","slug":"did-you-eat-your-weedies-today","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/?p=113","title":{"rendered":"Did You Eat Your Weedies Today?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Anybody remember that old commercial slogan, \u201cdid you eat your Wheaties today?\u201d Well if you do, you may not want to admit it; because it means you are getting older. Maybe not as old as me, though. I\u2019ve said it before and I\u2019ll say it again: I\u2019m old enough to remember when The Beatles came to the US on the Mayflower!! Sure, I can remember that; but I can\u2019t for the life of me remember when I had my last bowl of Wheaties.<\/p>\n

Well, this post is about a bowl of \u201cWeedies.\u201d Yes, I\u2019m talking about just what you might think that means. During this time of year, I’m known to feed weeds to my to my Beautiful Girlfriend and our family.\u00a0 We’ve eaten them many times, and we all survived! Yep\u2026 I’ve made many a \u201cskillet dinner\u201d and weeds that I harvested from the garden were thrown in there for extra yumm and nutrition.<\/p>\n

My two favorite weeds from the garden are delightful, annual \u201cvolunteers,\u201d as Grampa Bunny would call them. In other words, I didn\u2019t plant them\u2026 they just magically appeared from somewhere. Some of you may recognize them: lamb\u2019s quarters and purslane. Click on the images for a better view.<\/p>\n

\"Lamb's<\/a>

Lamb’s quarters above, purslane below.<\/p><\/div>\n

\"purslane6-28-13<\/a>

A closer view of purslane.<\/p><\/div>\n

Before I knew better, I spent several years cursing their very existence. Now we are glad to see them because they are one of the first things that are ready for picking in the garden. But one may well ask, \u201cummm first things ready in the garden?? Aren\u2019t they weeds??\u201d Well lots of folks call them weeds, and as I said, I thought that way also. Then I learned that both plants are not only edible; but taste pretty darn good! And an added bonus is they are packed with vitamins and minerals!! And to top it off, purslane has the highest concentration of omega-3 fatty acids of any leafy food plant.<\/p>\n

Yet another cool thing about purslane:\u00a0 it’s a succulent, which means it requires very little moisture to survive.\u00a0 It lays pretty flat to the ground and becomes a sort of “living mulch” as it spreads.\u00a0 This is good for the plants I actually wanted<\/strong><\/em> to grow.<\/p>\n

Lamb’s quarters have been eaten by humans for thousands of years, and have even been cultivated as a food crop.\u00a0 Just like purslane, the leaves and tender parts of the stems are of course edible, but lamb’s quarters seeds are very nutritious too.\u00a0 Those are great in soups and stir fry dishes (can you tell I like skillet recipes?).<\/p>\n

But hey, we just eat them because they\u2019re yummy. We like lamb\u2019s quarters and purslane either cooked or raw in salads.\u00a0\u00a0 Sometimes I\u2019ll bring them to work for lunch. I think my friends at work are beginning to wonder whether I\u2019m from a different planet. I often kick off the silliness by announcing what I\u2019m going to eat:<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m having weeds today\u2026 anybody wanna try some? I picked them from the garden.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cYou actually eat <\/b><\/i>the weeds??\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOh yeah,\u201d I reply. \u201cI actually mulched some of the purslane because it was doing really well. I wanna get some more of that stuff.\u201d<\/p>\n

Then comes a few quizzical looks, and the question, \u201cyou actually want <\/b><\/i> weeds to grow in your garden??\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cOnly the good ones,\u201d I say, smiling. Then the person or people will get a glazed look over their face\u2026 and I can tell they don\u2019t really want to know any more.<\/p>\n

There is hope for us \u201cweed eaters,\u201d though.\u00a0 Restaurants, for example, are getting interested in wild foods again; and \u201cweeds\u201d like lamb\u2019s quarters and purslane have gained recognition as valuable additions to various dishes.\u00a0\u00a0 Apparently they’re even being sold at local markets!!\u00a0 One year our daughter confessed that she paid $4.00 \/ lb for lamb’s quarters.\u00a0 I couldn’t help but chuckle when I heard that, and told her I had all she would ever need for free.\u00a0 This year I did<\/b><\/em> try to sell her some at $3.00 \/ lb; but she wouldn’t take the bait.<\/p>\n

Oh well, maybe when I retire I’ll try selling some weeds.\u00a0 I’ll need the money a lot worse then I’m sure.\u00a0 I can picture it now… a customer leaves my house in a hurry with a bag full of purslane on the front seat.\u00a0 They get stopped by the police for speeding, and the officer spies the produce and says, “what’s that on the seat there?”<\/p>\n

“Oh nothing officer, I just bought a bag of weeds.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Anybody remember that old commercial slogan, \u201cdid you eat your Wheaties today?\u201d Well if you do, you may not want to admit it; because it means you are getting older. Maybe not as old as me, though. I\u2019ve said it before and I\u2019ll say it again: I\u2019m old enough to remember when The Beatles came […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,32,17,31],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-113","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-edible-wild-plants","category-lambs-quarters","category-mulch","category-purslane"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=113"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":135,"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/113\/revisions\/135"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=113"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=113"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/kennysgarden.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=113"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}