In my foraging walks during late winter and spring, I’m always glad to find Navelwort (Umbelicus rupestris). It’s a fleshy, light-green plant often rooted in damp old walls and piles of rocks. Navelwort, also known as pennywort, is becoming rare.

I collect a few of the juicy leaves for use in my moisturizing formula, where they’ll add soothing, anti-inflammatory properties. Is navelwort edible? Yes, and if by chance I come across a place where navelwort grows abundantly, I’ll bring a few more leaves home to eat raw in salad – to be honest, more because I enjoy the experience than because of their flavor, which is mild and neutral.

For the hungry forager, we have a post about a tastier, more easily found wild edible: beet greens.

The seventeenth-century herbalist Nicholas Culpepper knew and appreciated navelwort, saying this of it:

“The juice or the distilled water being drank, is very effectual for all inflammations and unnatural heats, to cool a fainting hot stomach, a hot liver, or the bowels: the herb, juice, or distilled water thereof, outwardly applied, heals pimples, St. Anthony’s fire, and other outward heats.

“The said juice or water helps to heal sore kidneys, torn or fretted by the stone, or exulcerated within; it also provokes urine, is available for the dropsy, and helps to break the stone. Being used as a bath, or made into an ointment, it cools the painful piles or hæmorrhoidal veins. It is no less effectual to give ease to the pains of the gout, the sciatica, and helps the kernels or knots in the neck or throat, called the king’s evil: healing kibes (ulcerated chilblains) and chilblains if they be bathed with the juice, or anointed with ointment made thereof, and some of the skin of the leaf upon them: it is also used in green wounds to stay the blood, and to heal them quickly.”

According to the Plants For A Future Plant Database (PFAF), navelwort can be found in leaf all year, in flower from June to August. The seeds ripen from July to September. The species is hermaphrodite (has both male and female organs) and is self-fertile. The flowers turn red if the plant grows in a sunny spot.

Keep in mind that PFAF’s articles concern plants growing in the UK and Europe, not often mentioning growing conditions in the Levant. In Israel, where I live, navelwort has dried up and disappeared by July.

If you’re intrigued enough to try cultivating Navelwort, it’s (again, via the PFAF database) suitable for light (sandy) and medium (loamy) soils and prefers well-drained soil. Suitable pH: mildly acid, neutral and basic (mildly alkaline) soils. It can grow in semi-shade (light woodland) or no shade. It prefers moist soil.

I myself don’t think of cultivating navelwort; it’s too dry and hot where I live. But when I lived in the cool north of the country, where there are still many uncultivated green spots and ancient, fallen-down stone houses, I’d love to find the round leaves, that look like a collection of belly-buttons, poking up from some old wall. Those ancient Romans had a knack for naming things: umbilicus meaning navel, and rupestris, of the wall.

Or you can imagine  that a long-ago someone poked a finger into the leaves to leave a dimple in the middle.

I cherish navelwort not only for the uses I put it to, but because of its growing rarity. The places that favor its growth are fast disappearing under urban construction.

It recalls a much earlier time, when a kindlier climate allowed these innocent herbs to thrive undisturbed, and humans in their foraging took only what they needed and left the rest alone.

The post Forage Wild Herbs of the Mediterranean Winter: Navelwort, AKA Pennywort appeared first on Green Prophet.

Their protein content is among the highest of all vegetables. And, like wild chicory,  they’re free. See Karin’s take on wild garden edibles here.

Nettles are in season now in the Middle East. I go nettle-foraging every day, roaming the neighborhood empty lots and neglected gardens with a pair of scissors and a bag to put  the green goodies in. When I bring my harvest home, I rinse the leaves, shake off as much water as I can and then gently roll them in kitchen towels. Part of the nettles stay out for cooking right away. Mostly, though, I hang them up by their stems in my laundry area, where I’ve hung an old broomstick up for that purpose.

My harvesting method is to snip the stems off and not open the scissors until I’ve deposited the plant, head-down, into my bag.

My legs are protected with a long denim skirt and my arms, with a long-sleeved blouse. All the same, the dedicated forager must resign herself to getting stung at least a few times, even if she wears gloves. A sensible precaution in the field is to take note of where mallows or dock grow, usually close to the nettles.

Gather a few leaves; crush them between your palms and apply the crushed mass to the inevitable sting. At home, kitchen gloves provide protection while rinsing and sorting the fresh nettles.

I’ve been collecting nettles for so many years, I don’t even wear gloves anymore. The sting is oddly welcome. There may be something to the old theory that nettles sting relieves arthritic pain; certainly it encourages blood circulation.

Nettles should not be picked after they’ve fruited. Their green seeds are fine to eat, but the mature fruit, and older leaves, contain a substance that can irritate the kidneys. The photo below nettles gone to flower. Its stringy, leggy, stringy condition indicates old plant.

Nettles can be cooked in 5 ways:

1. Nettle Soup: Make one 4 cups vegetable stock. Add add 500 grams – 1 lb. of chopped fresh nettles 15 minutes before serving. Blend. For a hearty soup, make sure your stock has a chopped potato in it. For a creamy dairy soup, add 1 cup of sour cream to blended soup, stir well and heat the soup once again, without boiling, before serving.

A more detailed nettles soup recipe here.

2. Omelet for Two: Saute a small onion in olive oil. Add a small, chopped tomato. Add herbs to taste: za’atar is very good and so is basil. Stir in 1/4 cup chopped fresh nettles; cook over medium heat until they wilt. Beat 2 eggs and add to the vegetables. Season with salt and pepper to taste. Flip the omelet over to cook top side; or finish cooking it the way you’re used to.

3. Nettles in rice. Serves 4. Rinse and drain 1 cup rice. Fry in olive oil until heated through and coated with oil – about 3 minutes. Add 2 cloves crushed garlic. Stir in 1/2 cup chopped fresh nettles; stir again to distribute. Season with 1 tsp. salt. Add 2 cups boiling water. Cover the pot and cook over low heat until rice is cooked – 15-20 minutes for white rice, 30-40 minutes for brown rice.

A variation: cook quinoa with nettles the same way, using 1-1/2 cups water per cup of quinoa.

4. Puff pastry pie filled with nettles and potatoes: Make a filling of diced potatoes, onions, a touch of garlic and plenty of nettles, all fried in olive oil until potatoes are cooked through but still firm. Season. Roll puff pastry out into a rectangle and cut it in half. Place pastry in a greased or parchment-lined pie dish. Spread potato/nettles mix on top. Place second half of puff pastry on top and crimp edges together.

Brush top of pastry with a beaten egg. With a sharp knife, cut a few slits in the crust. Bake at 350 F – 180 C for 45 minutes or until the crust is a rich golden brown and a smell of done-ness fills the house. May be made dairy by mixing a container of sour cream and an egg into the vegetables before spreading on bottom crust (check for seasoning again).

Replace spinach with nettles in any recipe. The taste is not like spinach; nettles have their own, characteristic flavor. It’s earthy and herby and rather dark.

5. A medicinal nettles tea: 1 teaspoon dried, or 2 teaspoons fresh nettles per cup of boiling water. Cover and allow to steep 4 hours – overnight is better. Strain and drink. May be sweetened to taste. Dose for children: 1/2 cup three times daily. Dose for adults: 1 cup three times daily. Because of its easily-metabolised iron content, nettles tea is especially recommended for tired adolescent girls, pregnant women, and women after birth.

More on foraging and eating wild things:

• Foraging Your Windowsill – Grow Chickweed
• Ethical Foraging
• Recipe: Stuffed Jerusalem Sage

Photo of Nettles Soup and  photo of  flowering nettles via Shutterstock; photo of nettles drying by Miriam Kresh.

The post 5 ways to eat iron-rich nettles appeared first on Green Prophet.