Moss House

Dandelion the Golden

Posted on July 25, 2023 by Admin Posted in Fermenting, Foraging, Herbal, Medicinal, Preserving, Recipes .

Common Dandelion (Taraxacum officinale) is one of these plants which everybody knows about but hardly anyone appreciates, especially if they grow in gardens or on lawns, where they are promptly disposed of as weeds. Which is no way to treat this marvellous, edible and medicinal plant! Amazingly, all parts of dandelions are edible – although I do not recommend eating the seed heads; too much fluff! Blow on them in your garden on a windy day for fun instead, to spread the seeds.

There are a couple of lookalike wild plants flowering at the same time: Flatweed/Catsear (Hypochaeris radicata)and Sowthistle (Sonchus spp.) being the ones most commonly confused with dandelion. While edible, these plants do not have the same medicinal properties. A true dandelion can be recognised by the following:

Shape: leaves grow in a rosette from a taproot – no stems with leaves
Leaf shape: smooth, thin, no hair, deeply serrated edge (which is where the French name “lion’s tooth” dent-de-lion comes from).
Flower stem: single, unbranched, hollow, smooth – no hair
Flower: only one flower per stem (there could be several flower stems growing from one plant).
Latex: broken stems and leaves produce white, thick sap

The plant is full of nutrients, with the most important being vitamins A and K, calcium, magnesium and potassium. Dandelion has multiple medicinal uses: it is a known diuretic, blood cleanser, stimulates production of stomach acid and bile. Chopped and lightly boiled leaves are used as a face mask on acne-prone skin.

***If you harvest plants from public land, make sure the soil there is not contaminated with chemicals (such as glyphosate or firefighting foam residue), lead or animal faeces***

Let me show you what I make from dandelions I cultivate in my garden amongst trees, shrubs and perennials of the food forest. Maybe you will learn to love them as I do!

Leaves

Dandelion leaves are bitter tasting and an important part of an Italian wild green salad together with other bitter, sweet and also sour plants. Best time to collect: Spring and Summer.

To reduce the bitterness, they can be lightly blanched in boiling water and added to salads or used as replacement for spinach. But I prefer to ferment them (often mixed with other greens) because with no heat processing there is no loss of nutrients.

Fermented green paste

When dandelions flower, there are also many other plants which produce the first spring growth at the same time. I like to ferment young dandelion and nettle leaves for a “green vitamin bomb”, inspired by Pascal Baudar. I use whatever greens I have at hand: cilantro, dandelion, dill, parsley, nettles, fennel, some chickweed.

After weighting the greens, I add grated ginger at the 1/4 of their weight.
Per each 200 g of this mix add 2 grated cloves of garlic and 5 g of fine salt.
Use flavourings such as chili flakes, grated lime peel, powdered smoked paprika etc.
Chop the leaves finely (I use a blender), add grated ginger and garlic
Add salt, mix well, put in a large bowl and squeeze and press with your hands (like when making sauerkraut) until abundant liquid appears.
Pack everything into sterilized jars (use the ones with rubber seals and metal springs)
leave on the kitchen counter for about 2 weeks (don’t open!), then store in a pantry. After opening the jar it needs to be refrigerated (if there is any paste left…).
The paste is fantastic on sandwiches, with boiled eggs, cheeses, yoghurt, added to grilled meat or to soups.

Flowers

There are many ways to use the flowers, from eating them in salads, making wine, to dehydrating and powdering them to make a yellow dye. Fully opened flowers should be collected on a sunny day, preferably in the Spring.

Dandelion Salve

I make a rich, nutritious and anti-inflammatory salve from dandelion flowers and powdered black turmeric rhizomes. It repairs and refreshes dry and damaged skin, helps to soothe arthritic and muscular pain. I usually rub it on my hands, it’s a perfect treatment for a gardener!

How to make it:

Pick fresh flower heads, spread them on clean paper and leave for a couple of hours. This allows all little creatures to leave and moisture to evaporate a bit.
Measure the volume of flowers and add olive oil at twice the volume (I also added 2 tablespoons of powdered black turmeric per 500 ml)
Put all in a double boiler, bring water in the bottom pot to boil and keep it simmering for 2 hours.
Strain the oil through muslin. You could use the oil, or thicken it with beeswax to make an ointment:

Add 16 g of grated beeswax per each 100 ml of hot dandelion oil, mix well to dissolve the wax.
Put the pot with the hot mixture in a bowl of cool water and keep mixing using a stick blender until it thickens.
Transfer the ointment to small, clean jars with lids. Stores for a year in a fridge.

Roots

Roots are the most valuable material obtained from dandelion, with a high concentration of minerals and strongest medicinal qualities. They should be collected in Autumn/Winter when the plant is dormant, then dried for long storage.

Dehydrating roots

Clean the roots in water with a brush (try not to remove the thin skin which is tan-coloured – the flesh is white) until all soil is removed. Or almost all 😊 You can cut off the thinnest side roots.
Pat the roots dry and grate on a coarse grater, chop the smallest bits you cannot grate. You can also use a food processor set for chopping.
Spread chopped roots on a flat surface and leave to dry. I do this in a dehydrator, but if you don’t have one, use an oven or a room heater.

Roasting dandelion roots

Spread a thin layer of chopped and dried roots on a baking tray.
Heat an oven to about 150-180 degrees Celsius.
Put the tray in the oven for about 30 minutes (or longer, if you like the dandelion well roasted), but keep checking and mixing the pieces, so they roast evenly and don’t burn.
They should smell a bit like roasted coffee – when they are done to your liking, remove the tray and put the roasted roots in a dry jar with an airtight lid.
You could also powder the roots before storing them if that’s your thing.

I like to make a “dandy chai” infusion, to make one cup add the following:

1 teaspoon of roasted dandelion roots
1 teaspoon of dried rose petals
2 cardamom seeds
2 cloves
a pinch of cinnamon

Put all in a tea strainer in your favourite teacup, add boiling water, cover with a lid, let it steep for at least 5 minutes. After drinking the chai, you can reuse the mix for a second time!

You can tell dandelion is one of my favourite herbs and I use every part of the plant!

Dandelion’s usefulness extends beyond human consumption. Like many so called “weeds” it is a pioneering plant, growing in disturbed areas. Its long taproots break compacted and clay soils and create channels for water and air to penetrate deeper into the soil.

The bright yellow flowers attract pollinators into meadows and gardens.

And last, but not least, dandelions are great natural toys! I spend hours as a child making floral wreaths, chains from stems and blowing every seed head I could see 🙂

Make Native Bee Habitats from Clay

Posted on August 27, 2020 by Margaret Mossakowska Posted in Gardening, How-To .

Several native bee and wasp species nest in this little box filled with a variety of materials

Late winter is the best time to start preparing breeding habitats (misleadingly called “bee hotels”) for native solitary bees and wasps before they hatch in late spring. These insects are important pollinators, in some cases more efficient than honeybees because of their ability to buzz-pollinate, so if you want to have more tomatoes, capsicums and eggplants, make sure you attract the native helpers!

Because solitary bees do not have such extensive foraging range as the honeybees, if you create shelters and food sources for them in your garden, this is where they will prefer to stay. To do this successfully you would need to know how to make man-made habitats attractive to the bees.

Different species build their nests in different places: in the ground, inside dried, empty plant stalks, in borer holes in tree stumps and in cracks in sandy cliffs. Each species needs holes of certain size and depth to attract them and this is what you should know when constructing breeding sites.

I usually start making solitary bee habitats with the perforated clay/sand “bricks”. These habitats need to be made well in advance, because it takes a long time for them to fully dry out, so I make them in late winter. I also drill holes of various diameter in large blocks of hardwood, which attract resin bees and various solitary wasps. In both cases the holes must be “blind”, that is, not be drilled all the way through the clay or wood.

These habitats should be placed around the garden in sunny and sheltered spots, but do not install too many of them together to avoid easy spread of diseases and pests preying on the insects you want to attract to your garden.

Making habitats from a clay and sand mix (you can also use rammed earth):

What you need:

Clay: I usually get clean clay from people who excavated it from their gardens. It is important that you check if the area the clay comes from is not affected by heavy metal poisoning and has no asbestos residue.

Sand: Any sand will do as long, as it doesn’t contain too many pebbles.

Moulds: Milk and juice cartons make very good moulds, but you can also fill concrete or terracotta pipes or hollow concrete blocks with the clay/sand mixture and leave it there.

Method:

Mix the clay with water in a bucket, let it sit overnight, then agitate until most lumps are broken apart.

Strain through a compost sieve to remove stones and remaining lumps of clay. You should finish with a thick, smooth slush.

Add to the clay the same volume of sand and mix thoroughly. It should be the consistency of playdough, not too wet, and stick well together.

Pack the mixture into the moulds or pipes/blocks. Do not fill the latter to the brim but up to 4 cm from the top. When laid on the side this will create overhangs to protect the nests from the rain.

Use a stick to poke holes in the bricks about 6-8 mm in diameter and 6-8 cm deep to create leader holes which the bees will excavate further. Do not place the holes in perfectly symmetrical patterns, as this can confuse the bees trying to return to their own nesting holes!

Leave the clay habitats in a dry spot, protected from the elements, they should dry out in about 6-8 weeks. If you used carton moulds, tear them off after two weeks to allow sides of the brick to dry.

Install the habitats in the garden:

Terracotta and concrete pipes or blocks filled with the clay or rammed earth do not need protection from the rain and can be laid on the ground but raise them on pavers to prevent flooding and rising damp.

Clay bricks made in carton moulds would need to be protected from rains and could be either placed in waterproof boxes with a small roof over them or put on covered balconies or decks. I had several blocks in an open garden shed and before I thought about where to place them the bees found the nesting spots there!

Now you have nurseries for the pollinators, do not forget to grow flowering plants for them.

Common herbs: basil, chives, dill, fennel, hyssop, lavender, lemon balm, mint, oregano, rosemary, rue, sage, savoury and valerian are all good sources of food for the bees. Flowers of borage are high in sugars and proteins as is alyssum. Let some of your vegetables to flower and appreciate the value of so called “weeds” such as clovers and dandelions as bee food.

(You can also hear me talking about habitats for native bees in this podcast recorded for The Real World Gardener segment on the Community Radio Network)

The Summer of Abundant Cucumbers

Posted on December 23, 2018 by Admin Posted in Fermenting, How-To, Preserving, Recipes .

The cucumber season is peaking! We eat them fresh – as many as we can – and preserve the rest in various ways to enjoy them out of season.

While small gherkins are best preserved whole, even the occasional giant cucumber hiding under the leaves can be sliced and turned into a relish or marinated salad.

Here are my favourite recipes:

Cucumbers Fermented in Brine

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Each family has a matron who knows the smallest details of the family tree and can cook unbelievable food from the simplest ingredients. For me it was my great-aunt Barbara, whom I loved dearly. I still use some of her recipes, which for me is a way of remembering her fondly when eating the same dishes she used to prepare. This is her fermented cucumbers recipe:

Ingredients:

Small fresh whole cucumbers, washed
Fresh horseradish root –washed, peeled and cut lengthwise
Cherry leaves -washed
Garlic, peeled
Fresh dill flowers
Pure salt

Glass jars with glass lids and rubber seals, sterilised in boiling water. You can also use recycled jars with twist-on metal lids, but the salt in the brine will eventually corrode them.

Other ingredients you could experiment with are: black pepper grains, allspice, bay, oak, grapewine or horseradish leaves, yellow mustard seeds.

Method:

Make salty brine by dissolving 1 tablespoon of salt in 1 litre of warm water. Let it cool down.
Put at the bottom of each jar: a clove of garlic, a cherry leaf, 2-3 cm long piece of horseradish root and one dill flowerhead.
Pack the cucumbers into jars so they are wedged tight and don’t move. This is important!
Pour the brine into jars making sure that everything is covered by it and there is about 2-3 cm of headspace above the surface. Cucumbers shouldn’t float!
Put a rubber ring and a lid on each jar, attach the metal clips (or just screw the lid on tightly if you use recycled jam jars)
Keep on a kitchen counter for a week. There could be some foam coming through the seal if the fermentation is vigorous – that’s normal. If you see whitish mould-like substance on the surface, it is just a sign of yeast bloom. It will disappear in a few days.

You can either start eating the cucumbers after a week or put them in storage (cool pantry is ideal). They will keep for about a year.

The same ingredients can be used for fermenting in an open crock or wide-necked glass jar, which is good if you intend to eat the cucumbers within 10-12 days. Instead of packing the cucumbers tight, you need to weight them down with a glass plate or fermenting weights and cover the crock with a piece of muslin secured with a rubber band to keep insects away.

Sweet and Sour Pickled Gherkins

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Also known as “Warsaw-style gherkins” [ogórki po warszawsku], they are small cucumbers pickled with carrots, garlic and horseradish in a brine made from sugar and salt dissolved in vinegar. My take on this recipe includes apple cider vinegar and rapadura instead of white vinegar and white sugar.

Ingredients:

Vegetables:

1 kg of small gherkins, washed
1 medium size carrot, sliced
3 teaspoons of yellow mustard seed
1 clove of garlic, sliced
a small piece of horseradish root (finely chopped or grated)
a few fresh dill seed heads with stalks (chop the stalks)

Brine:

1 cup (250 ml) of 10% vinegar
4 cups of water
25 g of salt
80 g of sugar
3 bay leaves
1/2 teaspoon of black pepper (whole)
5 grains of pimento (allspice)
For more crunchiness add cherry or grapewine leaves.

Method:

Add spices to water (bay leaves, pepper and allspice) and bring it to boil in a pot
add sugar and salt and simmer for 15 minutes
switch off the heat and add vinegar; cover and set aside to cool down.
To each previously sterilised preserving jar add half a teaspoon of mustard seeds, 2-3 slices of garlic, a few pieces of horseradish root, a few carrot slices and a dill heads with chopped stalk.
Put cucumbers inside and cover them with brine, leaving about 2-3 cm of the head space.
Lightly close the lid and pasteurise the jars in a water bath immersed up to ¾ of the jar height for 2-3 minutes from the moment water starts boiling.
The cucumbers change colour from green to yellowish.
Remove jars from water bath, close the lids and after they cool, check if they are airtight.

The pickles are ready for eating after about 3 weeks and could be stored for a year in a pantry.

Spiced Zucchini & Cucumber Relish:

img_2100_pickles_spices A big harvest of large zucchinis or cucumbers and you cannot eat any more? Preserve them for winter by making this sweet-and-sour relish. For more colour, use yellow zucchinis, green cucumbers and pink/red onions.

It is a perfect accompaniment to meat, cheese, can be added to sandwiches or wraps.

Ingredients:

Vegetables:

1.6 kg cucumbers, not peeled
1.3 kg zucchini, not peeled
6 medium onions, peeled
6 tbsp of pure salt

Brine:

3 ¾ cup sugar
3 cups apple cider vinegar
3 tablespoons yellow mustard powder
1 tablespoon each: turmeric powder, ground black pepper and pure salt
1 teaspoon nutmeg powder
3 tablespoons of potato (or corn) flour

Method:

Use a slicing mandoline or thinly slice unpeeled vegetables with a knife.
Mix with 6 tbsp of pure salt, cover and leave overnight.
Drain the vegetables.
Dissolve sugar and 1 tbsp salt in vinegar and add all spices.
Put all grated vegetables with the vinegar in a pot.
Slowly bring to boil, then add potato (or corn) flour dissolved in ½ cup of cold water.
Stir until the relish thickens.
Fill sterilised jars with the mixture, leaving about 2 cm below the edge. Press the vegetables down to fill the jars well, without air pockets.
Wipe jars’ edges, put the lids on and tighten and leave to cool if storing in the fridge.
To prepare for long storage follow the pasteurising steps from the pickled cucumber recipe above, but extend the time to 20 minutes.

Like all pickles, they need three weeks to mature before eating.

Ferment Your Own Vinegars – Cosmetic, Edible and Cleaning

Posted on November 15, 2018 by Admin Posted in Fermenting, Gardening, How-To, Recipes .

In eastern Australia spring and early summer with their explosive plant growth are great seasons for making ferments from vegetables and flowers, while in autumn and winter it is mainly fruit that is fermented. In times of abundance I love to make various vinegars for cosmetic and culinary use, and also for cleaning and gardening.

Making own vinegars utilises fruit scraps and of flowers and gives you the satisfaction of having your own household cleaning aids instead of the store-bought ones. And the luscious, deep red rose petal vinegar is my skin toner of choice!

Now, the practical part – recipes!

Cleaning Vinegars

Before you put vegetable scraps (peels, apple cores, banana skins, cuttings etc) into compost, you can use them first to make cleaning and garden vinegars (also known as Eco Enzymes*, Garbage Enzymes*).

They are made from fresh fruit and vegetable scraps. Avoid using decomposing materials – what you want is to start the process of sugar fermentation which leads to the creation of acetic acid, the main component of vinegars. It happens when you mix fresh plant waste with sugar and water. The wild bacteria present in the environment will ferment the vegetable/fruit sugars from scraps and the added sugar and convert them into alcohol and vinegar. It takes about 3 months for all sugars to be used up and become the acid.

Ingredients:

300 g of fresh fruit and vegetable scraps
100 g of sugar (brown sugar, rapadura, molasses)
1 litre of water (preferably rainwater; if using tapwater, leave it overnight in an open bucket or boil and cool before using)
A plastic bucket with a tight-fitting lid (for example, a 2L yoghurt bucket).

Method:

Dissolve the sugar in lukewarm water.
Put the scraps in the bucket and cover with the prepared sweetened water
Close the lid tightly.
In the first month open and stir every day. The pressure will build up in the bucket (particularly in warm weather) and needs to be released. This is also why flexible vessel needs to be used – a glass jar can shatter under pressure.
For the next two months stir occasionally. You will see a film of yeast and bacterial blooms showing on the surface. This is normal and as the mixture becomes more acidic, these cultures will die.
After three months in the bucket, strain/filter the liquid into plastic bottles for storage and compost the solids.

Undiluted or slightly diluted the vinegar is an excellent all-purpose cleaner, which can be kept in a spray bottle in the kitchen or bathroom.

Use diluted in the garden (1 teaspoon per 1 L of water) to introduce bacteria to the soil and as a foliar spray to discourage pests and prevent white mildew in cucurbits.

Cosmetic Rose Petal Vinegar

Use the same method as above, but instead of fruit and vegetable scraps use fresh rose petals. Sugar can be substituted with raw honey.

You will have the best result with deep red roses with a true rose fragrance. I grow a Munsted Wood rose (pictured) which flowers 3-4 times a year and produces up to 200 fragrant flowers in the spring flowering and between 120-150 in each of the next ones.

Store the finished vinegar in small spray or pump bottles and use after washing your face to restore the natural, slightly acidic skin pH.

Apple Cider Vinegar

Every time I make a batch of apple sauce, I put apple peels and cores aside to ferment them into an apple cider vinegar. You could do this with pears, too.

This year I had a great success with wild apples I foraged in Autumn. They were small but very aromatic and made great preserves and ACV!

Ingredients:

1 kg of apple cores and peels
1.5 L of boiled water cooled to lukewarm
2.5 tablespoons of sugar (doesn’t matter what type as it will be completely fermented into acetic acid, but I prefer rapadura)
3 L glass jar or fermenting crock, sterilised with boiling water
piece of muslin and a rubber band

…or instead of sugar you can use wood (or birch) sugar – xylitol:

1 kg of apple cores and peels
1 L of boiled and cooled water
5 tablespoons of xylitol
3 L glass jar or fermenting crock, sterilised with boiling water
piece of muslin and a rubber band

Method:

Put all apple cores and peels into the jar/crock.
Dissolve sugar in lukewarm water and pour over the apple scraps. They should be completely covered.
Weight the scraps down with a fermenting weight or a small plate, so all pieces are submerged.
Cover the vessel with twice folded muslin or other loosely woven fabric and secure with a rubber band to protect the ferment from insects.
Keep away from direct sunlight.
In the first week you need to stir the contents, but do not forget to put the weight back in.
Depending on temperature, the vinegar will be ready in 2-5 weeks.
Strain through a sieve and muslin into bottles, close them for storage and use the vinegar as you normally would.

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*/ these ferments are misleadingly called “Eco Enzymes” or “Garbage Enzymes” and are promoted as miraculous treatments for everything from cleaning kitchens to clearing polluted waters. However, natural plant enzymes cannot survive the acidic environment which is the result of fermenting fresh plant scraps with sugar. And only a few plants (like green papaya) have the concentration of enzymes in fresh fruit high enough to have practical applications.

Preserving Edible Flowers

Posted on July 18, 2018 by Admin Posted in Medicinal, Preserving, Recipes .

It has been four weeks since the winter solstice and as the days are longer now, sweet violets started flowering in my garden. Their ephemeral beauty is pleasing to the eye, but there is more to flowers than just objects to look at.

In recent years I have noted a trend to use fresh, edible flowers or petals in salads and to decorate desserts. Cooked dishes such as fried and stuffed zucchini flowers also made it to mainstream kitchens, while cauliflowers, broccoli and globe artichokes (all of them heads of flower buds!) have been there for a long time.

It is important that flowers you want to preserve are picked straight after they open and when the morning dew has evaporated. If you collect only a little at a time, freeze or dry the flowers until you have enough for your project.

Edible flowers can be made into various preserves, such as dandelion wine and rose petal jam to mention the best known ones.

Many have medicinal uses, like calendula, chamomile, dandelion, Echinacea, elderflower or jasmine flowers; there are many less well known herbal treatments using other flowers, for example, daisies and sweet violets.

Speaking of violets. What will I do with the abundance of them? I have plenty of Sweet violets (Viola odorata) and Heartsease (Viola tricolour) and would like to make something special, so there it is – the recipes!

Violet Syrup

You will need:

100g of violet flowers
250g of white sugar
210g of water
1 small lemon, rinsed in boiling water, cut into thin slices
a sterilised glass jar with a lid

The method:

Bring the water to boil in a saucepan, add sugar, and stir until it completely dissolves. Set it aside to cool.
Rinse the flowers quickly in cold water, then put them in the prepared jar together with lemon slices.
Pour cool sugar syrup into the jar.
Close the jar and keep in the fridge for two days, stirring from time to time.
Strain into a sterilised bottle through a dense nylon strainer – do not press the flowers to remove the excess liquid.
Close the bottle and keep in a fridge.

The syrup adds the aroma of violets and pink colour to drinking water, second kombucha ferments, champagne or icecream.

Frosted flowers

Frosted flowers are used as cake and dessert decorations. Covered with sugar crystals, they look like enveloped in light frost, while retaining their shape and colour.

What you need:

Fully open, undamaged flowers.
Edible sticky “glue” – whipped egg white or gum Arabic
Small, soft brush
White castor sugar (normal sugar crystals are too heavy for most small flowers) on a small plate
Optional: citric acid (to be mixed with the “glue”; it helps to retain the colour of purple flowers)

The method:

Using the brush, paint the underside and then the surface of a flower with the “glue”, then gently dip the flower in sugar – first the top, then the underside. Shake excess sugar.
Put the flower away face up on a flat surface (baking tray or a dehydrator tray lined with paper).
Repeat with each flower.
Dry the flowers either in a dry, dark cupboard or in a dehydrator on a 40 degrees Celsius.
Store in a glass, closed jar in a cool dark place for up to a month (if using egg white) or up to a year (if using gum Arabic).
Use to decorate cakes and desserts.

Pickled Magnolia Flowers

Large, meaty pink flowers of Magnolia x soulangeana) are suitable for pickling. The flowers need to be processed soon after picking, otherwise they start turning brown.

What you need:

100 g of petals (about 10 large flowers)
brine made from 150 ml of coconut vinegar, 50 g of coconut sugar and 1 teaspoon of fine salt.

The method:

Sterilize jars and lids in boiling water.
Cut petals across into 3-4 mm wide stripes.
In the meantime combine vinegar, sugar and salt in a pot and slowly heat up, stirring until sugar and salt dissolve.
Add sliced petals, mix with the pickling brine until all pieces are submerged.
Put everything in jars, close the lids and after the pickle cools down, keep the jars in the fridge. Allow 2-3 weeks of pickling time before eating.

200 g of petals fills three 200 g jars – about 600 ml in total.

For other interesting uses of flowers look at Bottling plant fragrances on this blog!

Weeds: Forage and Feast

Posted on October 9, 2017 by Admin Posted in Foraging, Recipes .

I love foraging for edible plants, such as fruit trees in public spaces, native berries of all sorts or wonderful pioneering wild plants otherwise known as “weeds”.

Their ability to quickly colonise disturbed soils and survive harsh conditions is the testimony to their efficiency in extracting nutrients from the soil. This is why weeds are nutritional powerhouses and most of them are not only edible, but have also medicinal uses.

In recent years I have seen an emerging interest to learn about the value of weeds. Urban foragers such as Diego Bonetto or Oliver Brown teach how to identify wild edible plants and how they can be used.

Last Saturday I had the pleasure to co-host a “Forage and Feast” event with Diego, attended by nearly 20 people. We walked through a local park and talked about wild plants found there, then I cooked some of weeds (safely harvested in my garden) to give a group of budding foragers a taste of wild food. Hopefully this will encourage more people to make the leap from knowing about the value of weeds to actually preparing meals using them!

Below are the recipes I used on the day. The nettle soup is a traditional Polish dish and the two others are my inventions. Feel free to play with them!

Stinging Nettle Soup

Harvest young shoots in springtime when they are about 10 cm tall. If using older plants, only pick the leaves, preferably from the tips. The older a nettle is, the more fibrous; do you know you can make fabric from the fibres? Or use nettles to make dye?

But I digress. Let’s go back to the art of cooking nettles and a traditional Polish recipe for a nettle soup:

Ingredients:

300 g of young nettle leaves
1 onion, chopped
1 tablespoon of good frying oil or butter
1 L of stock (vegetable or chicken)
1 tablespoon of flour of your choice
1 egg yolk
juice from ½ lemon
100 ml cream (optional)
salt, pepper to taste

Method:

Rinse nettle leaves, blanch with boiling water, then chop finely.
Chop the onion, fry on hot oil until slightly translucent
Add the nettle, cover the pot, stew for a few minutes on low heat.
Add 900 ml of hot stock, mix well, then blend the soup using a hand blender.
Bring to boil, add salt, pepper, lemon juice to taste.
Mix the egg yolk with flour and 100 ml of cool stock, add to the hot soup, bring to a brief boil while mixing until the soup thickens.
Add cream (optional)

Serves 4

Dandelion and Onion weed Mini-frittatas

You can put any edible greens in frittatas, really. Think spinach, sorrel, dock, fennel, Warrigal greens. And dandelions 😉

Use fresh dandelion leaves (the younger the better) and large onion weed bulbs together with white parts of the stems. Despite its name onion weed tastes more like garlic than onion.

Ingredients:

2 cups of finely chopped and blanched dandelion leaves
1 cup of onion weed, chopped or grated
1 cup of potato or zucchini, grated
1 clove of garlic, crushed

(instead of chopping you can put all ingredients into a kitchen blender to chop)

1 egg
several tablespoons of flour (I use wheat or potato flour) – enough to thicken the mixture
1 tablespoon of chopped fresh marjoram leaves
Good quality frying oil
salt, pepper to taste

Method:

Blend chopped vegetables and herbs with the egg.
Add flour to thicken the mixture.
Heat oil on a frying pan and put small portions (1 heaped tablespoon) of the mixture on the hot oil, flattening them into round “cakes”.
Fry on both sides until golden.
Serve with grated cheese, or sour cream, or chilli jam etc

Chickweed and Mallow Pesto/Dip

Harvest whole chickweed plants using scissors – if you pull them up instead, there will be plenty of soil in the leaves, impossible to wash out well. Chop into small pieces.

Use young mallow leaves.

Ingredients:

2-3 cups of chopped chickweed plants
½ cup of mallow leaves
½ cup of olive oil
1 clove of garlic, crushed
juice from ½ lemon

Method:

Put all ingredients in a bowl and blend into a smooth pesto.
Add nuts (macadamia or bunya pine) and parmesan to make a pesto
Mix it with cottage cheese or yoghurt for a thicker, creamy dip or spread.

Winter is for strawberry planting

Posted on June 21, 2017 by Admin Posted in Gardening, How-To .

Winter is the best time to think about strawberries!

It is the mid-year solstice in Australia today, the first day of astronomical winter. At the time when you are all rugged up and nursing a cup of hot tea, planning for spring harvest will tide you over the coldest part of the year. Many bare-rooted plants are available now, particularly deciduous fruit trees and strawberries. Just the thought of fresh strawberries straight from your garden should propel you from your sofa towards the nearest plant nursery!

If you have no garden, you can still plant strawberries in pots. A common problem for plants in a strawberry pot (with pockets in the sides; also known as herb planter) is that not all plants get water down to their roots when watered from the top, especially when the pot is as tall as mine which you see here (70 cm tall with 8 pockets).

To deliver water to all plants I use a perforated PVC pipe (polypipe) placed inside the pot. The pipe serves as a moisture reservoir and will encourage the strawberry roots to grow deep into the pot rather than towards the surface of the pockets.

You could use either a piece of agricultural/drainage pipe (with slots already cut into it) or drill holes in a standard polypipe, like the ones used by plumbers.

Cut a length of pipe 5 cm shorter that the inside height of the pot, cap it at one end and wrap in a piece of drainage cloth (geotextile, agfabric).

Pack the pipe tightly with moist vermiculite or other water-absorbing material, such as perlite, cocopeat etc Be aware than unlike vermiculite and perlite (which are minerals), organic materials such as cocopeat will disintegrate in time. Cover the bottom of your pot with 5 cm of coarse sand and stand the pipe on the sand capped end down.

Put the pot in its final position – it will be too heavy to move once full! Make sure it is level. Fill the pot gradually with good potting mix with added vermiculite, planting strawberry plants from the bottom pocket up every time the level of the mix reaches each pocket. Water well with a seaweed solution. Mulch with straw or pine needles.

Now every time you water plants in the pot, pour water not just on the pockets (especially when they are young), but from the top and into the pipe as well. Vermiculite acts as a reservoir of water, slowly releasing it inside the pot.

I plant bee-attracting perennial camomile and Sweet Alice (Alyssum) on top of the soil to increase strawberry pollination rate. A small pot with flowering plants is set to cap the polypipe from the top.

Happy harvesting in springtime!

A Simple Self-watering Vertical Garden

Posted on November 8, 2016 by Margaret Mossakowska Posted in Gardening .

(published in Renew Magazine no 146)

A couple of years ago I built a small and simple self-watering system out of four recycled PVC pipes and plastic pots. It hangs on a very sunny wall and holds 39 pots, which I use to grow alpine strawberries, vegetable greens, leeks, larger seedlings and the likes.

How it works:

The pipes are laid horizontally and have large holes drilled in them to hold plastic pots. Long wicks (reaching halfway into the potting mix) are installed in each pot and absorb water from inside the polypipe. This allows the bottoms of pots to sit above water level, preventing anaerobic fermentation of the soil mix.

The benefits:

Space-saving. For those of us who have limited space (balconies or small gardens) it makes sense to go vertical.

Water saving. In a closed system with water coming directly into the root zone, the only evaporation comes from plant tissues, not from soil surface.

Self-watering. Depending on the size of the plants and the weather, sometimes the water lasts for several weeks. Pick up one of the pots weekly to check the water level and top it up through the pot-holding opening. You can also fertilise the plants at the same time by adding diluted worm juice or seaweed extract to the water (this is called fertigation).

No mosquitoes. There is no access to the water which prevents mosquitoes from breeding in the pipe.

No root disturbance when moving plants. Because each of them sits in its own pot, when you harvest or replace a plant you don’t disturb the roots of the neighbouring ones.

I’m sharing instructions on how to make such wicking polypipe system to encourage readers to grow food where space is at premium – on balconies, terraces and townhouses.

What you need:

A length of PVC pipe* (water and sewage pipes are 100-150 mm in diameter, orange electrical PVC pipes come in sizes up to 225 mm)
PVC caps to seal both ends of the pipe (and silicone sealant to do so)
An electric drill and a drill bit with a hole cutter. For a 150 mm diameter pipe I used the 110 mm cutter size (which fits standard pots 140 mm wide) and 130 mm cutter for larger, non-standard pots
A pencil and a ruler
A small metal file or rough sandpaper
A few palm-sized pieces of flyscreen
Plastic pots (I source mine from a recycling box at a local garden centre)
Offcuts of geotextile/agfabric or another dense, fluffy artificial fabric (polyester fleece or similar) to make water wicks. Simply cut the fabric into 25 cm by 3 cm stripes.
Outdoor paint*.
Materials for supporting frame – see instructions below

* I would suggest painting the pipes to protect the PVC from deteriorating in the sun.

Preparation:

Cut the pipes to the desired length.
Draw a straight line along the pipe and mark the centres of pot-holding holes on it (I drilled mine 160mm apart for 140 mm pots).
With a normal drill bit, drill small openings in the marked spots – they will serve as anchors for the hole cutter.
Using the pre-drilled holes, position the hole cutter and drill large holes.
Using a file or sandpaper, smooth the edges of the holes.

Place a pot in one of the holes and have a look into the pipe to check how deep the pot sits. This is to determine where to drill an overflow hole in the pipe end caps. The overflow should be about 5 mm below the bottom of the pots to avoid flooding the soil. Mark it on the cap.
Drill the overflow hole (about 4-5 mm wide) in one of the end caps and cover it from inside with a glued-on small piece of flyscreen to create a mosquito barrier.

Glue the caps with silicone to the ends of the pipe making sure the overflow sits in line with the pot holes.
Paint the pipe.

Support frame

There are many options depending on what materials you have available. My frame (pictured) is built from recycled hardwood fence posts, standing on concrete and screwed to the house’s wall.

I have seen metal angle brackets attached to walls and pipes hanging from balcony railings suspended on thick, galvanised wire bent to fit two pipes: a smaller one inside the balcony and a bigger one outside the railing.

Whatever frame you decide to build, make sure it can carry the combined weight of the pipe, as well as pots full of soil and water inside the pipe. My 150 cm polypipes can weight over 30 kg each when fully planted and filled with water. Don’t use guttering brackets unless your pipe is short as they will bend and collapse, not being designed to bear weight.

Preparing pots:

Push one or two wicks through pot bottom holes, so about 15-20 cm of fabric hangs down from the openings.

Add potting mix of your choice and fill each pot halfway up, making sure the wicks are stretched up through the soil (not just along the pot walls or squashed at the bottom).

Plant the pots, adding soil to the brim and water well.

Put them in the already installed polypipe, but leave one pot aside, so one opening is empty. Use it to fill the pipe with water until it reaches the overflow hole (this is also how you top up the pipe and add liquid fertilisers). Place the last pot in the last opening, sealing the system.

The wicking polypipe is a great and simple project to do before summer arrives, with heatwaves and time spent away from garden. Try it, I guarantee you’ll be happy with the results!

Winter Perennial Roots

Posted on July 31, 2016 by Margaret Mossakowska Posted in Gardening .

It is winter again, in my garden all the summer crops have been harvested (with the exception of self-seeded cherry tomatoes, which seem to be immortal!) and all the annual winter crops planted. You could think that other than citrus fruit and greens there is nothing to pick from a productive garden at this time of the year.

But growing useful plants is about more than annual vegetables and fruit trees, more than about just food. Winter is the time of the year when a group of valuable plants are getting ready to be dug up and processed to make food and medicines: perennial underground crops.

These plants accumulate nutrients and minerals in their roots, corms and rhizomes. All energy coming from the sun and nutrients absorbed from the soil go into their roots while all leaves die back for winter. If left in the ground in a frost-free area, the plants will sprout back when spring comes (although they will be crowded). I prefer to dig them up -saving the best parts for planting in spring, in fresh soil and with plenty of space – and process the rest.

Below I listed my favourites, which I replant every year (some of them were featured on the Moss House segment on ABC Gardening Australia show):

COMFREY (Symphytum officinale)

A large-leaved, deep-rooted perennial, it is recognised as the most versatile and useful of permaculture plants.

Comfrey is rich in nutrients, living manure, because its long taproots draw nutrients from deep layers of subsoil and bring nutrients into the leaves. I plant it around fruit trees and chop the leaves several times a year to spread them as mulch and to add to the compost heap as a high-nitrogen activator. Comfrey roots break through clay soils creating channels for water and worms, improving soil structure. If you allow the flowers to form, they attract many beneficial insects. Leaves fed to chickens help with forming sturdy eggshells, thanks to high calcium content.

Medicinal uses:

Known for centuries as knitbone, comfrey is a powerful medicinal plant used to treat swelling associated with broken bones and sprains, as well as bruises, surgical scars and varicose veins. Both leaves and roots work as ointments and poultices, but the roots are more potent. After the autumn harvest they can be dried and stored until needed.

See my recipe for a comfrey ointment on the Gardening Australia website

Gardening notes:

Use sections of the root or divided crowns and plant into loosened up soil with added compost, in full sun or partial shade.

Make sure you place comfrey it where it will be allowed to stay for decades – removing this plant is very difficult, because it grows back from very small pieces of root! It also self-seeds, so if you are concerned about that, trim the whole plant regularly to prevent flower stalks from developing.

HORSERADISH (Armoracia rusticana)

A hot-tasting white root of this south-European plant needs to be grated to release the pungent mustard oil. Traditionally it is served with meats and sausages, particularly with pork, because it stimulates and acts as a cleanser for the digestive system and prevents constipation. Moreover, the plant also has antiviral, antibacterial and antifungal properties.

In the kitchen:

Grated root should be used immediately or preserved with vinegar to be served with meat and cheeses. Pieces of root are great for making Polish-style fermented cucumbers.

You can wrap fresh meat and cheese in fresh horseradish leaves to protect them from spoiling; sourdough is left to ferment and then baked on a layer of leaves.

Medicinal uses:

Sinusitis: grate about ¼ of teaspoon of fresh root, hold it in the mouth to decrease the feeling of pressure. It loosens up the mucus blocking sinuses.

Gardening notes:

Good quality soil, enriched with manures is a must. Large leaves may suffer and wilt in sunny position, so try a spot with plenty of morning sun and afternoon shade.

Be aware that horseradish can spread and take over more space every year. Grow it in a contained space to prevent this happening.

SUNCHOKE (Jerusalem Artichoke, Topinambur) (Helianthus tuberosus)

Another sunflower relative, the sunchoke is cultivated for crunchy tubers, containing very little oil and instead of storing nutrients as starch the tubers are rich in inuline a complex carbohydrate with a very low GI.

In the kitchen:

Like yacón tubers, sunchoke contains complex polysaccharides. The tubers can be baked and cooked, their creamy consistence and slightly buttery flavour can enhance many dishes. They are also great lactofermented in a salty brine and the fermentation process uses up inulin, which in baked or cooked suchoke can cause flatulence.

Gardening notes:

Grow best in temperate climate, needs well-drained, sandy but fertile soil, rich in potassium (add wood ash or potash) and plenty of mulch. The tubers are planted in spring.

SWEET POTATO (Ipomoea batatas)

A starchy tuber grown at the base of a rambling vine, sweet potatoes are a versatile staple food, consumed cooked, baked or made into chips. Young leaves are cooked as greens or added to stir-fries. In the traditional Chinese medicine they are recommended as a much healthier alternative to common potatoes.

Gardening notes:

Sweet potatoes can be propagated from cuttings (slips) or by planting young tubers in good quality soil, with plenty of compost worked in. Be aware that the using tubers could result in transferring weevils from the mother plant.

The plants can spread quite wide and grow roots (and tubers) where the vines touch the soil, so make sure they have enough space to grow!

TURMERIC (Curcuma longa)

The turmeric root is mostly known for its culinary use and medicinal value as a powerful anti-inflammatory. Read what I wrote about this great plant in another blog entry

Gardening notes:

This is a subtropical plant, so avoid frost-prone areas. Plant turmeric in well fertilised soil in a sunny position. Space the plants about 40 cm apart as the rhizomes grow sidewise rather than down deep. Water well and often.

WATER CHESTNUT (Eleocharis dulcis)

It is a mud-loving plant, which can be grown in ponds or containers which are able to retain water at the bottom. The spiky, sedge-like leaves provide an interesting upright element in a garden if planted amongst other vegetation. The crunchy corms are harvested when the leaves turn yellow and need to be peeled before being processed.

In the kitchen:

They can be eaten fresh (tasting like a crunchy apple/coconut cross!), pickled, cooked or grilled and are a popular ingredient in Chinese dishes.

Gardening notes:

Make sure the container in which you grow water chestnuts sits in water, up to 1 cm above the soil surface. I grow mine in an old concrete laundry sink lined with pond liner to keep water level high.

YACON (Smallanthus sonchifolius)

Also known as Peruvian ground apple, this tall, tuberous perennial is a relative of a sunflower – you can tell this looking at its large, soft leaves and the shape of small yellow flowers appearing at the end of growing season.

In the kitchen:

The crunchy, sweet tasting storage tubers contain fructooligosaccharides, which are not metabolised in human digestive system. This makes yacón a good replacement for sweet fruit to people diagnosed with diabetes. These complex polysaccharides are also prebiotics (food for beneficial bacteria), that enhance colon health and aid digestion.

Eat yacón raw grated in salads, bake or cook, juice and reduce over slow fire to make a healthy sweetener. But my preferred method is fermenting!

Gardening notes:

For the tubers to mature, yacón needs a long growing season. Although it is pretty hardy (can withstand mild frosts) and grows in most soils, you will harvest more tubers if the soil is loamy and fertilised with compost.

ROOT STORAGE

A root cellar is a great place to store these vegetables (except for the sunchoke and water chestnuts, which are not suitable for long-term storage), but if you don’t have one, use buckets of sand or vermiculite for long-term storage and put them in a cool, dry place.

Choose undamaged roots, lay some at the bottom of a bucket making sure they do not touch each other, cover with vermiculite and add more roots. Vermiculite inhibits bacterial growth but doesn’t absorb moisture from the vegetables.

Water chestnuts store best if you peel and chop, then freeze them.

Classic citrus fruit preserves

Posted on June 19, 2016 by Margaret Mossakowska Posted in Preserving, Recipes .

I like this time of the year. From early mandarins in autumn to grapefruit in late winter, the cold months bring an abundance of aromatic, bright coloured, and juicy citrus fruit. It is so mouth-watering to take a bite into an orange just picked from a tree! But what do you do when you have more fruit than you can eat? Preserve it, of course.

I’m sharing two of my favourite recipes: pickled (salted) lemons and classical orange marmalade with a twist.

Pickled lemons

You pickle whole fruit – rind and flesh. The aromatic rind can be used in couscous, to spice up fish and poultry. The liquid should be strained and makes a powerful, acidic household cleaner. Spray it on mouldy bathroom tiles, clean greasy pots and ovens, or bleach stains on white fabrics.

Ingredients

0.5 kg (3-4) lemons, well scrubbed
0.5 cup large grain pure salt
1 cinnamon stick
6 whole cloves
2 bay leaves
1.5 cups fresh lemon juice (approximately)

Method

Wash and dry a 2 litre (8 cup) glass jar with a glass lid (a metal lid may corrode with time).

Cut the lemons into quarters lengthways without cutting through to the base so the segments remain joined at the bottom.

Place lemons in a large, clean bowl and sprinkle rock salt into the centre of each. Massage each lemon firmly against the base and side of the bowl to extract as much juice as possible, without tearing the skin.

Place the lemons, cinnamon stick, cloves and bay leaves alternately in the jar, fitting the lemons in as tightly as possible. Pour any liquid and salt remaining in the bowl into the jar and top up with enough lemon juice to completely cover the lemons.

Seal, label and date, then let stand for at least 6 weeks before using. The lemons will soften in the brine and may start to float. As a result, they may not be entirely covered by the liquid and can develop a harmless white mould. If this occurs, simply wash it off before using.

To use, remove a lemon from the brine and cut off as much rind as you need. Wash it well. When you have used all the rind, strain the remaining liquid and bottle it for use as a cleaner.

Notes:

This method of preserving lemons is popular in North African cuisine. Finely chop the rind and use to flavour pilafs, couscous and Moroccan tagines, or combine with chopped capers, parsley and garlic to spoon over fish. Stuff chicken with whole pickled lemon quarters.

The lemons will keep for up to 6 months at room temperature.

Orange marmalade

I like to add limes to this recipe, but you can make it with just oranges, grapefruit, mandarines etc

Ingredients

3 kg of citrus fruit (I used 2.5 kg of oranges and 0.5 kg of limes)
0.25-0.5 L (1-2 cups) of water or orange juice
2 kg of jam setting sugar (or any other jam setter as per instructions on the pack). A mix of sugar and pectine can be used as well – follow the producer’s instructions.
Optional: rind from 1-2 oranges, 5 cm of fresh ginger root (peeled and finely grated), 1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon.

You will also need a saucepan large enough to fill with all ingredients and sterilised preserving jars with lids.

Method

Wash the fruit and remove the skin – just peel it with your hands. Remove the white “lining” found under the rind. Save the skin from the 2 best looking oranges.

Slice the fruit in half, across the segments. The tough, white part in the centre must be cut out and discarded. Remove seeds. Cut the halves into thin slices and chop them up. Save any juice that leaks out.

Scrape and discard the white lining from the saved orange rind, then chop it finely.

Put everything (fruit and chopped rind) in a large pot and stir the jam setter into the chopped fruit. Put the mix in a big pot and set aside for a moment.

Note: you can also add some spice: 1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon or cloves, finely grated ginger.

Cook the fruit: add 1-2 cups of water or orange juice in a saucepan and simmer for 10 minutes.

Bring the mixture back to a full boil. Stir the mix and bring it to a full boil, hard, for one minute.

Test if it is thick enough: put ½ teaspoon of the jam on a cold saucer. It should quickly set, not flow.

Fill preserving jars (best if they are still hot from being sterilised) to within 1-2 cm of the top. Wipe any spilled jam off the edges, seat the screw-top lids on jars and slightly tighten them. Then put them into the boiling water bath for 15 minutes.

Lift the jars out of the water, tighten the lids completely and let them cool without touching or bumping them in a draft-free place.

Notes:

It may take up to two weeks for the marmalade to set and thicken up, so wait before you eat it! Properly pasteurised preserves will last from 12 to 18 months after you prepare them.