Noodles and Weeds!

And just how do we eat these little darlings? You can steam them, or boil them and they only take a few minutes either way. They turn bright glorious green and become very tender indeed. One good way to show off your weeds is with soba or udon noodles so you don't shock the folks who can only do spaghetti with spaghetti sauce. Voila, noodles and weeds! The Japanese noodles lend themselves very well to fun things like olive oil and soy sauce or umeboshi plum vinegar. (Wow. If you've never tried THAT, get thee to a health food store and check it out. It's a pink vinegar made from Umeboshi plums and it's salty as all get-out but just a splash makes all KINDS of things taste incredible - you may never do a salad without it again!) Here's what Lamb's quarters look like in Japan.

Now once you decide you love these grand weeds, you may want to get a bit more elaborate, or you may just want to cook them into a Quiche and serve it to the guests without saying a thing...then sometime before dessert you can let them know that it really was a DIRTWEED QUICHE!! (PPPPFFFFTT goes the coffee...)

Later in the season if you haven't eaten FAST enough to keep the lamb's quarters from going to seed, you may well want to gather the seeds and start tossing them into everything. These are indeed some of those astonishing seeds that were unearthed from an archeological dig from some 1,700 years ago that happily sprouted as soon as they were "kissed" by Mother N's trio of water, soil and air... When you want to gather yours, just hold a paper bag under the dry seed stalks and strip the seeds into the bag. Then later while you're watching a video or something rub the seeds between your palms and sift out the shiny black seeds. They can be tossed into oatmeal or tomato sauce, baked into all KINDS of things or used like poppy seeds on bread and rolls. They are true powerhouses of nutrition.

So if you learn to love lamb's quarters this summer, just think how your tongue will be hanging out for them in the dregs of winter.... Squirrel some away in the freezer. You'll be glad you did!

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