Dandelion Root Recipes
practicalselfreliance.com
practicalselfreliance.com
The number of intractable societal problems that would suddenly become non-issues if the average household engaged in basic permaculture boggles the mind. It’s hard to think of a more apt metaphor for our ills than the fact that we actively apply cancer-causing poison to kill them as a matter of course.
Now it’s expected you regularly spray chemicals on your lawn. Sometimes your neighbor can even use county, state, and city laws to compel you to do it.
So it’s a status symbol. Lots of people do deleterious things to achieve status. I don’t think it’s “weird” but rather maybe a bit dumb
Do you eat non organic cereals of basically any kind? Those are loaded with it too.
I'd very much like to put a border down for a 10' diameter circle out of my front lawn and dump wildflower seeds in there. They e got mixed that kind of come up as each flower's preferred season comes around. I figure if there's a border, that makes it a garden and not weeds even if my neighbors weren't super chill.
They are technically invasive where I am (northeast US) but I have never seen them take over an area so much as to choke out native species. I would argue that they have become naturalized.
I generally have a very light-touch approach to gardening, but even I draw the line at dandelions. The correct method of dealing with them is a trowel though, not weedkiller.
The flower stalks grow unbelievably fast too. I have been trying to rein in dandelions on my lawn this year, and thought I could control them by just snipping off the flower heads. Soon, I realized this would take an hour of labor a day that I didn't have to spend on lawn maintenance.
Believe you me though, there’s absolutely no way you could trowel your way out of my yard’s situation. Even (selectively) spraying wasn’t enough.
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2022/7/15/23218969/sri-la...
I'm an avid gardener and I love the environment but we have to realize the real numbers for how we feed ourselves. It would take about one acre of land to feed yourself on wheat in a year.
>An estimated value of 720 pounds of wheat is said to be consumed by a family of four yearly. 60 pounds of wheat can be got from a bushel. Since a bushel of wheat can be grown on 0.25 acre of land, you’ll need 0.75 acres of land per person. You’ll need approximately 3 acres of land for growing wheat and grain yearly for a family of four.
https://permaculturism.com/how-much-land-does-it-take-to-fee...
As others mentioned, the original idea is to supplement, and not replace. If every household strove to grow at least some of its food, we could probably reduce our need to transport, store, and distribute edibles by a non-insignificant amount. And the GP's point especially revolves around the lack of effort involved. While some crops require a lot of preparation and attention, in the case of "weeds" like dandelion, the effort can be no greater than walking outside and pulling them from the ground.
Plus,the University of Nebraska mentions this regarding winter wheat:
A review of seedling rates vs. yield potential is helpful. On average, there are 22 seeds per head and 5 heads per plant, or 110 seeds per plant. With an average seed size of 15,000 seeds per pound or 900,000 seeds per bushel, a pound of average-sized seed with 80% germination and emergence has a yield potential of approximately 1.5 bushels per acre. Seeding 40 lb of seed with a weight of 15,000 seed per pound has a yield potential of 60 bushels per acre. https://cropwatch.unl.edu/2019/determining-seeding-rate-wint...
Let's say a home grower could maybe get 1/4 of a professional farmer's yield. 45/4= 11.25 bushels per acre is 675 lbs per acre, which would be enough for four people for a year.
It makes me feel better about the feasibility of growing my own grains and living on it in an apocalypse. I've always wanted to try growing a field of wheat or something in my backyard. Maybe I'll try it someday. I've often wondered if garden grown grains and bread would have the same massive difference in quality and taste that you get with a homegrown tomato vs. store-bought.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sonchus
In fact, I appreciate sow thistle even more than dandelion. People assume they must be bitter or even poisonous because they have white sap and can look kind of ugly in their late stage of growth, but if you pick them when they're tender they aren't bitter at all. If a person wasn't aware they were eating a common weed, they might assume they were eating a gourmet green from the produce section. I've used it to substitute spinach for creamed spinach, and though it doesn't taste like spinach, it was very tasty. But I usually just pick and eat the greens raw!
Specifically, I am referring to the "sow thistle" that is of the genus Sonchus. It is not a true thistle, and I think that there's other plants called "sow thistle" that aren't this one.
I've never tried using the roots and don't know whether they have properties similar to dandelion. Dandelions may have a leg up in terms of the root, but I'm not sure. Sow thistle is otherwise highly nutritious.
As someone who's been foraging for over a decade, I find it crazy how most foragers completely overlook this plant despite how it's both common and tasty in contrast to many of the more sought-after plants.
Here is a good article on identifying sow thistle which also includes a recipe:
https://www.eattheweeds.com/sonchus-sow-thistle-in-a-pigs-ey...
EDIT: And here's a video by the same author of that article:
While it is edible, it should be noted the leaves are a good diuretic, which may be an undesirable effect for some.
...yes? All of those sound like good things to try; are you attempting to disagree?
So, you're doling out (what you think is) knowledge, while objecting a couple of levels above, to others doing the same?
Did you invent Nature, that you are so sure of its purpose, or lack of purpose?
If you think others are getting it wrong, give some objective proof, first, for why you think your statements are right, including any of them.
Otherwise, you are as little credible as the people you dismissed out of hand.
But you may not be aware that animals do eat other animals and it's not very nice, so start here https://www.google.com/search?q=lion+kill+hunt if you are unfamiliar with the process.
That was exactly my point above, though stated indirectly as a reductio ad absurdum style argument, somewhat sarcastically.
IOW: Either one can make a rigorous argument, XOR one can make an informal one. Upthread, both you and your parent commenter made the latter kind. Ergo, their argument is as valid or invalid as yours. Yours is not more valid, although you may think so.
QED. :)
Other edible plants I listed, but that does not make them gifts, their edibility is incidental.
You noticeably failed to address my point that nature's 'gift' includes an unpleasant process of killing and carnivory which I assume is pretty bloody unpleasant to the subjects of a hunt, given that they don't run towards the predators.
> Upthread, both you and your parent commenter made the latter kind
He made no such argument, just described nature in anthromorphic terms
> Either one can make a rigorous argument, XOR one can make an informal one.
That's a misunderstanding based on the assumption that there is a clear dividing point between formal and informal. If you had any background in mathematics you would know this is not true. There is no absolute definition of formality, it comes in degrees.
> Ergo, their argument is as valid or invalid as yours
Assuming you're claiming that we're both using informal arguments, this is mistaken as well because informal arguments can have degrees of evidential backing; some informal arguments are stronger than others.
On the whole I get the impression you just want to score points here rather than learn anything or actually help anybody. Shall we not continue?
Thinking about, they might have told us it is poisonous to keep us from playing with them, because the sap colours skin and clothes brown with hard to remove stains.
Once I learned the reality around "drugs" it was a startling lesson to me that you need to question authority figures, even though this at times can infuriate them. Now with teenagers of my own, hearing some of the things their teachers teach them as "fact" can be depressing, especially when it's tech-related and it's clear that the teacher has absolutely no idea what they're talking about.
Why should you care whether or not they're infuriated? That's a very subservient perspective you have.
When it's a state who can throw you into a cage and lock the door for extende periods of time, you're going to care. If you don't, I would seriously question your sanity (or honesty).
Oh yeah, they also gave a bunch of those horror stories about them, some of which I am sure were true, but many obviously weren't.
This was shown by multiple studies [0], but the program ran many more years.
It could be a coincidence that everyone involved in the program profited immensely from it.
The guy who started DARE, Daryl Gates, was roundly blamed for LAPD's racist culture; so much so that he 'retired' after the Rodney King riots.
Here's a fun quote of his: "... blacks might be more likely to die from chokeholds because their arteries do not open as fast as they do in 'normal people'."
0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drug_Abuse_Resistance_Educatio...
LOL OK. But actually most of them do.
It was however playground lore that touching them and licking your fingers would make you wet the bed. Indeed the French name for them is literally that, pissenlit, which they must have had good reason to choose over the perfectly fine English name for them, dent de lion.
As noted, dandelions are bitter in taste, and this can be mitigated by blanching them --- putting them under a heavy stone is one way to do this, or one can dip them in boiling water briefly. It also softens them a bit.
Really, just saying "they're poisonous" would be quicker and the outcome wouldn't be all that different. They do have to be treated as poisonous, kinda, in urban and suburban settings.
I found this video on their history interesting.
Dandelions and Civilization: A Forgotten History: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xyePMeGE3CI
In particular, I did not realize that they were brought over by settlers. Likely on purpose as a food source/herb then spread with western expansion. Another thing I remember is that he says there are accounts in China of roots getting much longer. 10+ feet IIRC, compared to 2 claimed in this article. Although that's a bit hard to believe. I guess it is used in traditional Chinese medicine.
Of course now they are just seen as a weed. I guess I have mixed feelings The yellow flowers themselves dont put me off but seeing large patches of them after going to seed dont look good. Unlike many here probably, I do like a pristine lawn but even still I don't think the flowers themselves are a pure eyesore.
This seems like the primary metric we as a society use for assessing plants as weed or desirable. I wonder if it is the right metric or whether we should start with the environmental impact (and what metrics would make this assessment, like impact to pollinators, etc).
And humans are like, "fuck that, I just want grass. God forbid any little flowers should pop up on my lawn."
(disclaimer: I don't mean to shit all over your lawncare - I just find the impulse kind of funny. It's fine that you like a pristine lawn, to each their own).
Tidiness reflects the care and love of the person responsible to his or her surroundings (that is, his environment). Its hard work to weed your lawn, to prune your roses, to edge your sidewalk! Keeping the lawn you painstakingly weeded weed free is a study of grass' lifecycle.
That being said we now have the worst of both worlds. We're lazy and irresponsible but want to pretend we're not to our neighbors, so we hire a bloke to spray poison everywhere. We have lawns where there is no water instead of coming up with a neat yard with more suitable vegetation.
When I was growing up I was so annoyed at my dad who made me pull weeds out by hand with him. Why couldn't we use Round Up like every one else? Now I see the wisdom of his monk-like personality.
Next was the plantains, buckhorn, and uncommon.
The big thing is, eliminating such weeds means that the grass needs to be cut less often, since it's the growth rate of the grass which determines this, which is an important consideration since I use a reel lawnmower.
Dandelions, for example, thrive in calcium-poor soil conditions. Their deep taproots mine the calcium from below the grass’s root zones and surfaces it up to the leaves. If you don’t harvest the dandelion yourself and “chop and drop them” over the course of several seasons, the soil will have sufficient calcium for other plants to outcompete the dandelion.
In other words, dandelions are pioneer plants, and has a role within ecological succession. They are great for soil building.
You could, of course, just add oyster shells into areas of large numbers of dandelions. But you would not get the benefit of a dandelion breaking up compacted soil.
I too use a reel lawnmower. But I’m slowly turning my front yard into a perennial garden, which is a great hedge against inflation.
Since then we've gotten compost from the township and raked it over the lawn to fill in low spots, and I'd like to think that allow over two decades of grass clippings to mulch in have helped as well.
I also allow the grass around the edges to grow long and cut it by hand w/ clippers, spreading it for birds to make nests of.
Garden areas are my wife's problem.
Now everyone is doing it, and it turned into something expected instead of a sign of wealth long after the truly wealthy moved on to other signals of wealth. People even somehow associate it with an aesthetic. A common justification I have heard are, “I want kids to be able to have some place to play”.
It’s amazing to me how cultural ideas set and ossify.
NoLawns is going mainstream though. There are alternate ground covers (white dutch clover, or even thyme), and people are posting beautiful, tidy, but ecologically resilient and diverse non-lawn landscaping on r/nowlawns.
I'm familiar with the history but this is too reductive. I don't care about those things as evidenced by many other ways I chose (not) to maintain my image with my neighbors. But uniform, healthy, green grass looks nice. To me and many others. I don't even put in that much effort and I dont hate clover, dandelions, etc. I also appreciate the no lawn movement because it reduces maintenance.
This is a very very specific way of demonstrating care and responsibility to environment. It's extremely informed by culture and history and the ecological specifics.
Maybe you didn't intend it but the implication that choices other than tidiness are not loving and responsible is very gross.
Nah, no offense taken. And I would like to clarify what I mean. I think large swaths of perfectly uniform and healthy grass looks very nice. I even think it's commendable when people put in the time and energy (and gather the knowledge) to maintain their lawn to this high standard. I would say I'm about 1/2 to 2/3rds to that extreme. I can live with some dandelions, clover, a few bare spots, etc. I find you need to increase effort exponentially to maintain a lawn to a high standard. So I commiserate with the "no-lawn" movement from a "remove things that need maintenance" perspective.
I also think people have lots of unknown biases when it comes to lawns. In particular geography. I live somewhere pretty green. I'm on well water. For all intents and purposes water is a free, unlimited resource for me. I think many people here are from west coast or even just cities so they come to this discussion with the assumption that water is scarce.
Have you ever seen the lengths people go to for pumpkin competitions? I fully believe that people committed to the cause could grow 10' dandelion roots. Tons of fertilizer, optimized "sun" exposure, repeat for generations and propagate the seeds from the record-setters.
He and his siblings loved vegetables as during certain times of the year they were the one thing they had "too much of". Everything else was basically rationed but they would get various peak harvests where they could eat until they were full.
Europeans brought them over to the New World they were a common food source and used for medicine.
Dandelion comes from Lion's Tooth in French due to the look do the fine pointed flower leaves.
They are seen as a nuisance now since lawns were once only for the very rich. You had land you needed to grow all your food on it.
A local biologist said "no mow May" is nonsense bees should be using wildflowers not dandelions. To bees dandelions are like junk food the pollen is poor quality.
Dandelions do not need to pollinate seeds are ready to go that's why they are so numerous.
All parts of a dandelion edible young leaves taste good but old are bitter, such is life.
I'd prefer the name 'dent-de-lion'
What pretty crocuses! And there are some beautiful tulips. Here we have some bed-pissers. What a lovely rose bush! Oh, look out for that patch of pants-shitters. Etc.
My favorite cocktail with the gin/tincture is a Bees' Knees but substituting lime and agave for the lemon and honey. I call it a Dandy Lion!
It doesn't taste like coffee, but it tastes good, and it's close enough in flavor to scratch the itch. Much better than carob or chicory. (Although chicory mixed in with coffee à la Café du Monde is great.)
At this point, he is an authority in the foraging community, and his books are well-written. Got all of them in my bookshelf.
I'm surprised Dandelions didn't get cultivated to have much larger roots.
Basil is a cultivated herb that often breaks out of containment and goes wild. Sometimes, people will redomesticate those because the ones that survive the local conditions are well-adapted to the climate.
https://www.agefotostock.com/age/en/details-photo/wild-carro...
Purslane is another good example. The domesticated ones have larger leaves, but the wild ones are good eating if you know it hasn't been sprayed.
Isn't it strange?
I mean, that's literally what life does: make really good soil, eh?
https://abitofhome.ca/dandelion-burdock-330ml.html
If you do feel like putting an order of weird British stuff, I'd recommend: Tunnocks Snowballs, Ribena Sparkling Blackcurrant, Jacob's Jaffa Cakes, Chivers UK Lemon Curd, Hula Hoops Variety, Twiglets, Tunnocks Milk Chocolate Caramel Wafers, Custard Creams, Twirl Orange.
All delicious!
Dunno how D & B's made, but American root beer isn't made with the "real" ingredients anymore. They're banned because if you give a megadose to mice, sometimes they get cancer. One of those "maybe actually bad, but maybe not really and just overzealous regulation" things.
I mean, also I'm sure it's cheaper to make fake-flavored root beer, but there'd at least be some craft ones making it the real way. But no, it's banned.
Dandelions are pretty prolific but I would also be mindful of abundance when foraging other plants. If there is only one or a few of them around, don't take it. There's a 1-in-20 rule for this.
There are a ton of books, YouTube videos, and probably some in person classes in your area on this stuff.
My city's landscaping services are fighting a losing battle with a local patch of Asian knotweed. Mowing it down doesn't do much because it just grows back and spreads.
It can be a problem if you can't prevent it from setting up foliage. At least it's somewhat edible, and the dry stalks have airtight sections that explode if lit - kids love it.
[0] https://greekcitytimes.com/2021/11/05/greek-leafy-greens-goo...
That's... literally, by definition, not true. Edible specifically means, per https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/edible , "something that is suitable or safe to eat". If you could only eat it once, it wasn't edible.
(Also, what's even your point? Dandelions are actually edible.)