Everyone ready to plan in a walk to do some micro-foraging? Here is our Monthly Active10 #Walk2Forage Walking Challenge for February .
And if you haven’t read our introduction to this monthly challenge, first head back to healthunlocked.com/active10...
We will wait here until you return ….
…. Right! All caught up?
Well, for last month’s challenge, I’ve failed to get some nettles although I did manage to get a few walks in. But somehow I couldn’t find a single nettle! Would you believe it!? I bet this will change as it gets lighter. I’ll be catching up on this as soon as any nettle-tops emerge!
February, our second #Walk2Forage is about an edible forage food which also is said to grow all year. It is the cute titled and looking chickweed, supposedly one of the earliest wild vegetables to come into leaf.
Richard Mabey describes it as “one of the most deliciously tender of all wild vegetables”.
So, here is the info I gleaned from the two referenced books:
🌱 CHICKWEED: Find in gardens or by field edges, even in winter months. Easy to cut with a pair of scissors.
🌱 FLAVOUR: like lettuce
🌱 HOW TO PICK: Whole sprigs, with leaves, flowers and stems can all be eaten.
🌱 NUTRIENTS: High levels of vitamins A and C, minerals like iron and calcium
🌱 HOW TO USE: Blend into pesto or soups. Or add as garnish to winter salads. Or put washed sprigs in saucepan with butter, seasoning and some spring onions. Simmer gently for 4 minutes and finish with a dash of lemon juice.
NOTE: Avoid confusion with stiff, hairy, mouse-ear chickweed or the smooth, upright and red-stemmed spurge, which is toxic. Edible Chickweed has a unique feature – a single line of fine hairs that runs along its stem, alternating sides between nodes. This characteristic helps distinguish it from similar-looking plants.
If you are not sure, leave it and just enjoy the nice walk. Always stay safe when foraging. You need to be 100% sure of your identification, 100% sure that your foraged item is edible, and 100% sure that you are not allergic to it (it is good practice to always try a small amount of any new food you are consuming). If in doubt, leave it out!
But if the search for foragable food got us out there exploring the world on another walk, it’s done it’s magic in my book! The edible is just the icing on the cake!
🥾🌱🥾🌱🥾🌱🥾🌱🥾🌱🥾🌱🥾
So happy walking and exploring those nature wonders! And don’t forget to take a picture and report back here!
For any walks, we can obviously also use our own Active10 app, or use any Steps app, or none at all. Steps are steps.
I have added the link to our key app below, but there are many more that can be used:
Active10 on iOS apps.apple.com/gb/app/nhs-a...
Active10 on Android play.google.com/store/apps/...
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★ SOURCES:
FORAGED FOODS, in: Huw Richards, Sam Cooper, The Self-Sufficiency Garden. Feed your family and save money. 2024. Dorling Kindersley. P195
Richard Mabey, Food for Free. Collins Gem.
And here is a good video to help identify chickweed. It also has a inedible but cute dog! 🐶
Go Outside (2 min) Foraging Wild edible Plants, Chickweed
