Cattails. North America's most widely abundant edible.
I've been scouting out the cattails and making note of those that were in areas least likely to be affected by things like lawn fertilizer runoff and large amounts of trash. It's amazing how much trash you see collected in the low areas where cattails often grow. But there were a lot of healthy cattails near a local lake, so those were the ones I chose to use.
The first thing to be done was to cut down the cattail at the base of the stalk, peel a couple large leaves off, and cut again about a foot from the bottom. This let me leave the site taking only what I really needed - the last 6" or so of the inner stalk.
I have some dried dill leftover from last year but I decided to spice this batch of pickles up with some of my fresh garden basil and leftover wild garlic cloves that I set aside from roasting recently. For the basic recipe I used Ball's Dill Pickle Recipe with Reduced Sodium. Instead of dill, I inserted two small garlic cloves and two basil leaves into each jar.
I've been scouting out the cattails and making note of those that were in areas least likely to be affected by things like lawn fertilizer runoff and large amounts of trash. It's amazing how much trash you see collected in the low areas where cattails often grow. But there were a lot of healthy cattails near a local lake, so those were the ones I chose to use.
The first thing to be done was to cut down the cattail at the base of the stalk, peel a couple large leaves off, and cut again about a foot from the bottom. This let me leave the site taking only what I really needed - the last 6" or so of the inner stalk.
I have some dried dill leftover from last year but I decided to spice this batch of pickles up with some of my fresh garden basil and leftover wild garlic cloves that I set aside from roasting recently. For the basic recipe I used Ball's Dill Pickle Recipe with Reduced Sodium. Instead of dill, I inserted two small garlic cloves and two basil leaves into each jar.
Probably half the cattails I collected were too hard. I started with 4 pounds and ended up with 1/2 pound to can. Yikes! But I was choosy and only canned the very best and most tender inner stalks. Hopefully these will be a nice side to go along with baked fish.
Image credit: Cale Ruiz
Image credit: Cale Ruiz