I foraged this wild salad around my hotel. It was better than any meal I had the whole week I was working in Washington, DC, earlier this month. And it was free! Come into my post and see what I found and how I made my salad.
I was in the city for a week of meetings and hob-nobbing, with a lot of restaurant meals and catered working lunches. I made this salad after my work obligations were over. I had scheduled an extra day to enjoy the sights. So before I headed out, I went to pick my lunch, to enjoy it later in the day.
1. Foraging My Salad
In an urban setting, I don't pick by busy roadways, where plants might get sprayed with chemicals, where soils might be contaminated, or from protected parks. But there are still plenty of good places to pick -- like an overgrown area behind the hotel. What did I see? Wild grape vines and two different kinds of mulberry trees!
Tender young leaves and tendrils from wild grapes can have a tart lemon tanginess. But every vine is a little different. These weren't sour like my Concord grape vines back at Haphazard Homestead. These Riverbank grapes (Vitis riparia) had a mild greens flavor.
Young mulberry leaves have a mild greens flavor, too. Most of the leaves I found were too old and tough to eat, but the trees were still putting on new growth from the tips of their branches. The youngest leaves were still tender.
I wasn't concerned about eating these grape and mulberry leaves. The hotel groundskeepers were clearly hacking the plants back and tossing the debris into the wild area. They weren't spraying the wild area, either - it was growing thick and lush, without any twisted or discolored vegetation.
The mulberry trees had lots of ripe fruit, too! So it was easy to tell that I had two kinds of mulberries. The fruit of the Red Mulberry (Morus rubra) is a deep purple-black when it's ripe -- not red! The red fruit are not ripe. They are green and not worth picking. The white fruit are even less mature!
The White Mulberry (Morus alba) has the sweetest fruits - they are super sweet! Both the green and ripe fruit are white. But the ripe fruit are much more plump and they take on a glossy look -- like a sweet little grub, lol. The sweetest ones have a faint pink hue, too. They are so good! I've noted the ripe mulberries with the white stars.
I found a big dandelion, too, growing under some trees. Dandelion leaves can get big in the shade! I didn't take a picture of the dandelion, though, until it was in my salad bowl. Even in a hot place like Washington, DC, in June, there are can be dandelions tasty enough for a salad. I'll show you what I mean in a future post.
2. Traveling With My Salad
I had a container left over from a take-out lunch earlier in the week. I put my greens in one container. I made sure to pick clean and pick organized, as always! I put my mulberries in an empty little cardboard box that had cookies in it. It's a good thing I eat healthy salads to balance out the things I eat that are not so good for me! The box kept my mulberries from getting crushed.
I brought along an orange from the hotel's guest fruitbowl and some water, too. Then I headed out on a rented bicycle, along the Potomac River, towards the U.S. Capitol.
3. Making My Salad
To make my salad, I washed and the greens in my container, drained them, and then chopped them into small pieces.
I peeled and chopped the orange. And then I added the mulberries. I mixed it all and let it sit about 10 minutes. That let the juices from the orange blend with everything, like a salad dressing.
This was a great salad! I would serve this salad to anyone, it was that good! With some sliced red onion and black pepper, this could be served in any fancy restaurant, no question about it!
Plant List
- Riverbank grape - Vitis riparia - tender young leaves and tendrils
- Dandelion – Taraxacum officinale - monster greens, growing in the shade, center rib stripped out (that's a trick that most people don't know)
- Red mulberry - Morus rubra - tender young leaves and ripe fruit
- White mulberry - Morus alba - tender young leaves and ripe fruit
What Do You Think?
I hope you get to enjoy such a great wild salad sometime! Wonderful ingredients may be near you, even if you travel to a big city!
- Do you eat grape tendrils and young leaves?
- Do you use dandelion leaves in salads?
- Do you eat mulberry leaves?
- Do you eat mulberry fruit?
- Would you try eating my wild hotel salad?
If you want to see my first Wild Hotel Salad post, here it is: Free Hotel Salad - Wild Style! It's from the Colorado Front Range in March. I'll be posting some other travel foraging from this spring, too, so say tuned!
I write about foraging because I believe that we can all have lives that are richer, more secure, more grounded, and more interesting by getting to know the plants and the land around us – in our yards, our parks, and our wild places.
I would like Steemit to be the premier site for Foraging on the Internet! If you have any thoughts about foraging, or experiences to share, write a post and be sure to use the #Foraging tag. And check out the @foraging-trail to see curated quality posts about foraging. Happy Foraging!