Cardoon is a vegetable from the thistle family, like artichoke. It was brought to North America by early settlers from Southern Europe, and seeded itself in the wild in some areas, like the California Bay Area. In this video we harvest leaf stems from a wild plant, cook it, and let you know how it tastes.
Even though foraging - finding edible wild plants, researching and preparing them - takes so much time and effort, it's good for our health in many different ways. First, you get out there in nature, get exercise, breathe fresh air, enjoy the views. Second it's the excitement, like mushroom hunting. And then there is a benefit of eating plants that grew not in the agricultural setting, where micro-elements in the soil were exhausted years ago. A wild plant contains wider variety of minerals. Consider it a homeopathic remedy, in the rare occasion you pick'n eat from the wild!
This is an old time favorite in Italian cooking. In Italian it is pronounced : Car-doh-neh.
You can first steam it in a steamer pot, to soften and bring out the juices, then cook it slowly in a cast iron pan with garlic. You can also pre-boil it instead of steaming. It needs slow cooking until it softens, or else it will stay on the bitter side. Adding a small amount of acidic liquid to the pan, like vinegar or lemon juice, will also improve the flavor.
In the next cardoon video I cook and taste cardoon buds • Can You Eat Wild Cardo...
27 авг 2024
