~My Basic Garlic Mustard Pesto Recipe~

While Garlic Mustard continues to persist throughout our Great Lakes bioregion and threatens to crowd-out wildflowers and native vegetation, we can consider one of its virtues:  It is edible!

Like many early spring greens, the flavors of the Garlic Mustard are predominantly bitter. Different parts of the plant, as well the age of the plant can affect the degree in the bitter flavor. 

Great Lakes Herbalist Jim McDonald believes that the Bitter flavors of plants, while having a negative connotation to many, may be one of the keys to our wellness.  Bitter flavors help stimulate digestion, bile production and can support healthy liver function. Other bitter plants that are beneficial to add into the diet include parsley, arugula, romaine, radicchio, endive, dandelion, and coffee. Best thing about Garlic Mustard as a bitter - it can be easily harvested for FREE with little concern of damaging its plant population! 

Forager and wild food expert, Steve Brill, explains early basal roots are more bitter in the spring, the fleshy stems less so - and it is sweeter in the fall after a frost. The roots are slightly nutty, and the second year plant should be harvested just before it flowers… But don’t get caught up in these rules — if you are pulling it to preserve other plants in your garden or a participating in a pull, use it and partner it with other flavors like parsley, walnuts and lemon to suit your palate! 

One of the most popular ways to prepare Garlic Mustard is preparing it as a versatile, delicious pesto. Variations on pesto recipes can vary to suit personal taste preference and the flavor of the Garlic Mustard that is being harvested. 

Want to prepare a large batch? Pesto can be made without the nuts (they tend to taste rancid after thawing) and froze into ice-cube sized portions that will last for several months until the local Basil is ready for harvest here in Michigan.

Need ideas for uses of the Garlic Mustard pesto?  The pesto can be added to pasta, used in soups (like a French soup au pistou), served on crackers with cheese as an elegant appetizer, or even used as a base for a wild foods pizza of local Michigan Morels, homemade soft cheese, and wild onion.  

Burdock & Rose Basic Garlic Mustard Pesto Recipe

4 cups leaves, stems of Garlic Mustard (washed)

1 cup wild chives  

1 cup wild garlic scapes

1 cup parsley (if desired)

1 cup walnuts (or pinenuts - though I am not a fan)

4 TBSP olive oil

1tsp sea salt, pepper, squirt of lemon juice to taste

Add all to food processor, puree.  Check flavor, add parsley, salt, pepper to preferred taste. Serve over crackers, on pizza, pasta, soup… the ideas are limitless and the pesto can be used in similar ways to traditional basil pesto. 

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To  learn more about the vices and virtue of Garlic Mustard, check out my write-up in The Rapidian! 

~RealFood herbal remedies ready for kid testing~

Concord grape juice popsicles & slushies with a dash of our elderberry & shallot syrup. No sugar added - only honey is in the blend for sweetness with the added benefit of its antimicrobial properties.

Constitutionally I think it may be bit cold for Emma’s croup and not the most effective use of the aromatic onion, but figured what the heck.

It’s a kid-friendly creative way to get her to eat these power-packed foods. And if she doesn’t like it, I’ll keep playing with the recipe. 

From Salads to Sipping… Bitters are in.

Bitters. What are their tastes? How do they make you feel? Having a hard time recalling the last time you tasted a bitter food? 

Once upon a time - before refined sugars, boxed food and takeout - bitter flavored foods were pretty prevalent in our diets. Wild diets fruits, nuts, berries, greens all provided not only a well balanced course of fats, vitamins, and minerals but also offered up a bitter flavor that helped trigger the body’s response to aid in digestion by kicking into gear the pancreas, liver, and galbladder. This happens when the taste receptors on the tongue come into contact with the bitter-flavored foods.

Now most Westerners get the bulk of their bitters through foods like coffee, chocolate. A lack of bitters in our overly processed diet of course can be connected to the sluggish digestive issues many of us suffer. That said, given the diet and lifestyle we lead as Westerners, I know few people (if any) that couldn’t benefit from the addition of little bit of bitters in their life.

Of course, one of the best ways to add in nutritional bitter foods is to  incorporate more bitter greens like radicchio, endive, dandelion, and arugula into everyday meals.

One of our favorite salads in one gathered from our immediate yard — dandelion greens, new shoots of parsley, tender wild garlic scapes. No need to eat the greens plain - a nice lemon vinagrete complements well the flavors of the bitter in the greens.

This re-wilded salad may take getting used to at first, but we are so used to the flavors now that we are craving the spring bitter greens and can’t wait until the thaw!

Bitters can also be enjoyed as beverages.  Classic cocktail ingredients like the liquor of Campari, Aperol, and Angostura bitters are popular commercial bitters that are frequently used in drinks served as aperitifs before meals.  Coffee and other anise and mint bitter flavored drinks are commonly served as digestifs post-meal to keep the digestion flowing.  One of my own personal favorites is Campari and Soda, or a Negroni (which I prefer Hendricks Gin, Campari, and Lillet Blanc). 

Wild plants can be found and foraged making your own bitters.  Herbalist Jim McDonald made a FANTASTIC extract of Quaking Aspen whose flavor profile I am finding as complex as a simple as Campari is as an herbal recipe.  It’s a beautiful flavor - and good enough to be worked into a cocktail recipe or two.  I might try making my Negroni with this delicious ingredient. 

Other basic culinary foods like garden mints, orange peel, and fennel can be extracted in vodka or organic grain alcohol to be used as bitters and blended into drinks or recipes to help stimulate a slow digestion. The recipe combos really are endless! Welcome to the world of mixology!

Other fun ways to sneak bitter flavors into the diet include popsicles. I think I may try this citrus-based recipe for Campari popsicles from The Kitchn. I’ll play around with it to make a non-alcoholic version for the kiddos while serving the real deal to the adults on my patio this summer. 

I look forward to sharing new recipes and creations and love to hear others’ ideas.

How do you like your bitters?