Homeblog

Garlic mustard salad

Foraging garlic mustard for its edible salad leaves bulks up this week’s serving in the 52-week salad challenge.

If, like me, your windowsills are groaning under the weight of plants destined for the great outdoors in a month or so, you might find yourself being rather begrudging towards any new salad leaf sowings. I am currently filling my space with pumpkin plants and plug sowings for the balcony, and anything else has been rather forgotten.

This week, I harvested my last indoor cut and come again lettuces and mustards until the pumpkins move outdoors. The salad still wasn’t all that bulky, and so I scampered down the street to a bank where I know the garlic mustard and green alkanet grow, and did some foraging.

Garlic mustard leaves have a great punchy strong flavour. They are best served in salads as young leaves, and you can cook the larger, tougher leaves as you would kale. I wouldn’t serve them alone in a salad as their garlicky flavour can be rather overwhelming, but a big fat handful makes a big difference to your dish.

I don’t pick these plants when they are flowering, as the leaves really are far too garlicky, but I’m a fan, and fortunately for me, as they are enthusiastic self-seeders, there’s always more garlic mustard to be gathered by my doorstep.

Don’t forget to follow others taking part in the salad challenge on twitter using the hashtag #saladchat. And if you don’t have your own blog but want to write a post about your own experience of the challenge, then use our Your Blogs section.

2 Responses

    • F&F

      thanks Charlie: yes, it’s a good way to deal with a plant that isn’t always welcome!

      Reply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published.