Young knotweed shoots are top of the list when I think of my favourite spring vegetables. Sour, soft, and very adaptable.
It's far more fun to eat Japanese knotweed shoots than to pour glyphosates on them. Put away the Roundup, and whip out your pruning shears or oldest kitchen knife and get slicing. Or invite some local foragers over to de-shoot your clumps of knotweed. While the herbicide schills claim that glyphosates degrade too fast to harm the environment, studies are mounting that suggest the opposite.
I still wonder whether repeated harvesting of the shoots might not deplete the underground rhizome of its energy and eventually lead it to die off. Would a progressive park manager not allow foragers to collect the shoots from a designated Japanese knotweed patch? The plant is out of control in our local parks and I see no harm in such an experiment, and much potential benefit.
Above? My lunch today: Japanese knotweed and field garlic soup, with a drizzle of field garlic greens oil.
How about a nice slice of homemade sourdough to go with that? Looks amazing.
ReplyDeleteExactly what I had! The last little slices of last week's loaf, with field garlic butter. About to make some more. Bread, that is.
DeleteMarie, did you see this article in the NYT. Just something to chew on.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/23/dining/be-patient-and-make-tartines-country-bread-your-own.html?hpw&rref=dining
Nancy Mc
Wow, that soup looks delicious!
ReplyDeleteoh, marie, although i am glad to have discovered you, the nostalgic longings for wild edibles, albeit invasive, prompt me to beg you for a source of seeds or plants..i have been looking for sprouts of Japanese knotweed for years..anyone out there can help?
ReplyDeleteHi Nadine. Forgive me for pulling out my soapbox, but please do not ever plant Japanese knotweed, if you find it. It is highly, successfully, noxiously invasive, and will dominate the plant community in which it finds itself.
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