Eating weeds: Purslane trumps pizza

For once, I am out of words. The middle owl-cat (7) proclaimed in a fit of passion that he prefers this dinner to pizza.

Michael Pollan tipped me off to the culinary potential of this unassuming weed that is full of vitamins and omega-3s. We tried it a while ago in a salad, but it is a bit hard to eat raw after weeding it out of the vegetable patch for years. It may be a bit like someone telling you, "Go ahead, add raw chicken to your salad. It's actually a real cancer fighter!" It's just hard to get past some things.

But after I tried out this recipe for verdolagas last week, we had to have it again this week. It's that good.

I hate to replicate recipes that another hard-working food-blogger has put together and deserves credit for. I will describe the basic steps, so you get an idea of what it is. Then you can go to the source for the recipe. It's brilliant.

Of course, you could always substitute spinach for the purslane, but how fun would that be?

Verdolagas (see link for full recipe; my recommendations in italics):

1. Make a simple green tomatillo salsa in the blender.
2. Boil 2 diced potatoes in salted water (suggested, but not used in the original)
3. Wash and chop the purslane (stems and all).
4. Boil the purslane. Add a little lemon or lime juice to the water in an attempt to preserve the color of the bright green leaves.
5. Heat oil in a pan. Toss in some garlic. Add the green salsa.
6. Drain purslane and add it to the green salsa.
7. Drain potatoes and add it to the green salsa and purslane.
8. Heat a cast iron pan. Heat corn tortillas on the cast iron until there are brown specks on one side. I make a quesadilla with a corn tortilla, split it open and proceed with step 9. The owl-cats like cheddar. I like feta in mine. 
9. Fill tortillas and roll up like a taquito. Or fill with other veggies and eat like a taco.
10. Be prepared for compliments.

Cool summer breakfast: Soaked raw buckwheat with fresh fruit

This is like raw granola, according to my friend L.N. She eats it with yogurt and fruit.

We tried out raw buckwheat last week when we went on a three-day vegan cleanse (more on that later, including why Owl would ever do such a thing). Thus, we omitted the yogurt. I tried it with rice milk, but it was better without.

Soaked Raw Buckwheat

Buy buckwheat groats at a natural foods store. I paid just over a dollar per pound.

1/3 cup buckwheat groats per serving
Fresh fruit
Tepid water to cover

1. 30-60 minutes before you want to eat breakfast, rinse the buckwheat in a fine strainer. Leave it in the strainer and place in a larger bowl. Cover with water.
2. Let soak for 30-60 minutes. (Just the right amount of time to fit in some exercise!)
3. Lift the strainer out of the water. The water will have turned a bit brownish and goopy. Do not be alarmed. This is supposed to happen.
4. Two options here, depending on your feeling about the matter, because I've read both are true:

• Rinse the goopy buckwheat, believing that this helps digestion.
• Don't rinse the goopy buckwheat, believing that this helps digestion.

5. Your buckwheat is softened and ready to eat.

What we thought: We would definitely eat this again. The buckwheat had a nice nutty flavor. Owl says he could have it every other week. I could eat it more often, especially in the summer. The kids wouldn't touch it, so we don't know if they would like it.

Variation: Another morning we tried the soaked buckwheat blended with dates, rice milk, and cinnamon, then topped with pumpkin seeds. It made for a more oatmeal-like consistency. I thought it was fine, but Owl had the good-willed grimace he sometimes has when something is off. It tasted more autumnal than I was feeling on a June morning, so I'll try it again then.

Russian Grandma Homemade Sauerkraut = Good

Why eat sauerkraut?

• You won’t get scurvy.
• Your digestive system will be very happy.
• And some people even claim your love life will improve. (This was what got Owl interested.)

But these are all just ruses to get you to try sauerkraut—created by people who know a very good secret: good sauerkraut is goooood.

My friend E.D. learned how to make this sauerkraut from a Russian grandma. I must admit, I was skeptical at first. As much as I love a good kitchen experiment, leaving some cabbage in a jar for a month sounded like bacterial roulette. But it works. Read about the science behind it here.

Russian Grandma Sauerkraut

What is most innovative about this recipe is the method of putting the sauerkraut in a manageable size—a quart jar. It requires no large stones on top of vats of fermenting sauerkraut.


Prep time: 15 minutes

Wait time: 3-6 weeks, depending on temperature

1 head green cabbage
2 carrots
2 tablespoons SALT, plain SALT—not iodized salt—sea salt if you are fancy
Wide mouth quart jar

1. Chop cabbage and carrots—E.D. does this with a knife. I use a medium grating disk on my food processor for ease. It needs to be fairly fine to get it into a jar.

2. Put cabbage and carrots in a big old bowl and mix salt into it. Of course, you will be wanting to know if you have enough salt because that is what is keep the bad bacteria at bay. A good test for this is to taste the salted cabbage. If you want to spit it out, then you have enough.

3. Let sit for 10 minutes. At this point, it will release water if you squeeze it.

4. Grab handfuls of cabbage and knuckle them down into the jar, pressing on the cabbage to make sure there are no air bubbles and that the water remains above the cabbage.With the amounts listed, the sauerkraut should fill the jar.



5. Put a jar lid and ring on. Put the jar on a plate and place in a cooler place (60-70ish degrees). It will release more liquid in the first week, which is why you want to have a plate underneath.

6. Let sit without disturbing for 3-6 weeks. This is a step you will just have to learn by trial and error. I usually open mine at 3-4 weeks, and that is perfect for my taste. It will continue to develop its sour flavor the longer you let it sit. But once you open the jar, it is done with fermentation.

7. After opening, refrigerate. (Alternately, if you are like E.D., you can make 11 jars at once and store through the winter in a root cellar. I’m sure Russian Grandma would heartily approve.)