Hunting wild herbs in a urban enviroment

Can you come up with a tasty, healthful salad, just by foraging the urban neighborhood That would be the ultimate in locally grown food. But most of us don't know the first thing about foraging wild greens. the seeds taste like a cross between sweetened oatmeal and lettuce. By a wall at the back of a parking lot, I discover edible dandelions. My biggest worry when foraging urban plants is that they may be contaminated with herbicides. How to avoid them? Know the area you're foraging, I suggests and check plants closely for damage that could be caused by spraying. stumbles upon an overgrown planter box full of edible greens including prickly lettuce, shepherd's purse wood sorrel. Henbit, a type of wild mint. Any place you live there's probably 75 different wild vegetables you can add to your diet over the course of the year, I find some common chickweed good for salad-making along a fence. I pull some tender young chickweed from next to a rock in Chinatown. One reason people get turned off by wild plants is that they eat the wrong parts or eat them at the wrong time of year. I chomp on some common chickweed while digging for more wild treats in the green spaces So we start out looking for wild greens in a hunt for wild greens. I am a leader in efforts to revive the ancient art of foraging. As we step out the door, I start scanning the landscape, then I run across the street, dodging cars. "I'm looking for green," I say. I hit the jackpot, right across the street: chickweed growing along a chain-link fence. But just because I am passionate about wild foods, it doesn't mean he'll eat any old plant. A block away, he tests the succulence of a patch of henbit and dead nettle by tasting. A few plants are just too urban, like a prickly lettuce growing at the base of an office building. Prickly lettuce is the ancestor of cultivated lettuce, pointing to the lone plant in a sea of blacktop. "This one is covered with some kind of dust from the building, so we won't be collecting this. In another vacant lot lambs quaters grows proficiently. wILD gREEN qUICHE Serves 6 Milkweed flower buds available a few weeks earlier in the season are a fine, broccoli-like substitute for the milkweed pods. If wild greens are not available, you can substitute chopped spinach. The use of cottage cheese reduces the number of eggs otherwise needed. feral green quiche 1/2 cup canola oil 2 tablespoons milk or cream 1 1/2 cups whole wheat flour 1 tablespoon sage 1/2 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon pepper 1. Mix together the liquids first, then add the dry ingredients. Press into a 10-inch pie pan. Bake 5 minutes in a preheated 425°F oven. Filling 1 medium onion diced 1 tablespoon canola oil 1 cup grated gruyère cheese 1 1/2 cups 1-inch milkweed pods, cut in half and parboiled 1 cup loosely packed chopped lamb s-quarter leaves 2 eggs plus two additional egg whites 2 ounces small curd cottage cheese 1 tablespoon chopped fresh parsley 1 teaspoon each fresh basil, ­tarragon, and oregano Salt and pepper to taste 1. Lightly sauté the onion in the oil (do not brown), and place in the baked pie shell. 2. Next, add half the grated cheese, then all of the milkweed pods and lamb s-quarters. 3. In a separate bowl, beat together the eggs, egg whites, cottage cheese, herbs, and salt and pepper. 4. Pour the egg mixture over the ingredients in the pie shell and top with the remaining grated cheese. 5. Bake at 350°F for 35 minutes. If the top of the quiche browns too quickly, cover it with aluminum foil and continue baking. Let the quiche stand for a few minutes before serving. From a fast running creek, I pick some watercress. A little while later, we happen across a clump of weed-like greenery with an intense garlic aroma which Identifies as hedge mustard. Sorrel, a zingy, lemony green that comes back year after year, makes an interesting addition to fresh salads and is the star of fresh, lemony sauces and creamy sorrel soup. In a small shady woodlot, I find sorrel growing.