Lesser celandine – Edibility, distribution, identification
Prior to flowering, lesser celandine is one of the milder spring leaves, so good for bulking out salads of more pungent leaves like hairy bitter-cress and ramsons…
In Season Now
Velvet Shank Mushrooms – Edibility, Identification, Distribution
In bleak midwinter, when mycophogists start to look hungry and haunted by the paucity of pickings, velvet shank (Flamunilla velutipes) can put a glint back in their eye. It grows between November and March, when, in Scotland, there aren’t so many other mushrooms about…
Spring and Summer Weed Salads
A few thoughts on how to combine pungent, bitter, sour, mild and aromatic spring and summer plants into a satisfying and tasty salad
Watercress – edibility, distribution and identification
Watercress is a delicious peppery salad vegetable, but unfortunately it is prone to infestation by the cyst stage of a parasite (fasciola hepatica) when growing in land containing livestock…
Cow parsley – identification, edibility, distribution, comparison with Hemlock
Cow parsley is the predominant roadside plant from March through to June, when its delicate, nodding white flowers adorn nearly every rural roadside in the country – hence the old name of Queen Anne’s Lace.