Leaves that you can eat, but you didn't know you could, till you did!

[ancee]

I've just discovered belatedly that you can eat beetroot tops. I had no idea, and am now thrilled that you have a two for one veg! Funny I don't like beetroot, but I like the leaves! Does anyone know of any other leaves you'd ordinarily throw away but you can actually eat? I know you can't with rhubarb, but you can with celery, but after that, I have no idea! Can you eat Turnip leaves for example?

[mothhawk]

You certainly can! They are a bit prickly, sort of, raw, so best cooked, I think. Check this page out.

[ancee]

Ooh! That's brilliant, thanks Mothhawk. They are a bit prickly, but I have this new steamer thing which looks like a spaceship which sits over your pan so I am going to give them a go when they get a bit bigger. Or I might soften them with a bit of butter and salt and see if that's tasty. Brilliant

[Penellype]

You can eat most brassica leaves, so things like broccoli are fine. Also pea and bean shoots.

[Jay-ell]

Radish leaves, cauliflower and swede. If you trim the leaves of the swede down at the end of winter they should send up new growth in spring as an early green. Hops - the shoots that weren't needed for the bines can be cut off and cooked like asparagus. Scorzonera leaves can also be eaten as a spring green

Aralia cordata which is a decorative herbaceous perennial has edible shoots as well. Lime leaves (the Linden tree not the fruit) can be used as a lettuce substitute. Nettles make soup and loose the sting once cooked.
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Pull the leaves off the next dandelion you find on your plot but leave the rot crown intack then stick an upturned bucket over it to produce blanched salad leaves (keep doing that and the dandelion withers away whilst you feed)

[muddled]

Pull the leaves off the next dandelion you find on your plot but leave the rot crown intack then stick an upturned bucket over it to produce blanched salad leaves (keep doing that and the dandelion withers away whilst you feed)

Ooh! didn't know that one!

celeriac leaves have a wonderful celery taste and I use them in cooking all winter (which is lucky because celeriac nevers bulbs up for me and I've yet to produce a single decent stem of celery)

nasturtium leaves of course in salads.

raspberry and blackberry leaves make good teas.

[Jay-ell]

Blackcurrant leaves can be used to make tea - but it shouldn't be consumed if you're pregnant, although in the last couple of weeks it's supposed to ease labour.

[Jay-ell]

Ooh! didn't know that one!
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Of course you could dig up the root, chop it, roast it, grind it .and use it as a coffee substitute

[Peppermint]

Both turnip and radish leaves make excellent soups.

Florence fennel fronds makes a lovely pesto and I use the stalks as a substitute for celery in some recipes. Both freeze very well.

[Marb67]

Wild garlic, newly emerging "bread and butter" hawthron leaves, land cress which is a weed found everywhere, lemon verbena, lovage, young borage leaves.

[Jay-ell]

I forgot chickweed and ground elder.

Suddenly my plot is 75% cultivated (now all I need is to find a recipe for bindweed soup)

[rary]

I forgot chickweed and ground elder.

Suddenly my plot is 75% cultivated (now all I need is to find a recipe for bindweed soup)

Jay-ell, how do you use the above weeds

[Sarico]

Courgette plant is edible. That's why I grow extra and cut the plant when the first baby Courgette start to grow. Excellent with pasta.

[Jay-ell]

Jay-ell, how do you use the above weeds

An interesting site for all these extra edibles

Chickweed Chic | Eat The Weeds and other things, too

And another one

https://scottishforestgarden.wordpre...-ground-elder/

[ancee]

Courgette plant is edible. That's why I grow extra and cut the plant when the first baby Courgette start to grow. Excellent with pasta.

Sarico, do you mean the leaves or the stalks or both? I never knew that? theyre so spiky too! We eat the flowers and the courgettes of course!