Here’s a short Urban Herbology post from 9 years ago, about how to make a little harvest of wild garlic go a long way. Click on View Original Post, to open up and see some of the benefits of this herb and a simple way to use it over several weeks. I hope it helps you. If you want to learn lots more about wild garlic, I run workshops about the plant, throughout the season. The next one is on Sunday 6th March 2022. Details are on the events page.
The woodland floor in Frankendael Park is carpeted with flowering snowdrops and the emerging leaves of Ramsons (wild garlic, Allium ursinum). I’m sure snowdrops have their uses but when you find them, Ramsons are an urban herb forager’s dream. All parts of the plant are edible and very useful, though the leaves and flowers are all you should use. The bulbs should be left alone and only pick a leaf or two from any plant. They taste truly delicious – if you like the taste of garlic! They taste best, by far, before the pretty white flowers open and can be eaten from early spring, when the first leaves emerge from the soil.
Ramsons have similar properties to Garlic but are milder in all respects. They are also more tolerable to those you have difficulty digesting other members of the onions family.
Meat and potato pie is the comfort food that potatoes were designed for. Well, in my mind anyway.
I had lots of yoghurt pastry dough, potatoes and some meatballs to use up today. I also had a couple of succulent, fresh Wild Garlic leaves in my fridge, which I had picked this morning. The logical combination for these ingredients was a meat and potato pie, packed with Wild Garlic flavour.
500g caserole beef
(I used 2 big meatballs in gravy from Scharrel Slagerij de Bouter and 250g organic minced beef)
1 medium onion
Olive oil
500g peeled potatoes
2 Wild Garlic leaves, torn or chopped
1 quantity of yoghurt pastry dough
1 stock cube (I used mushroom)
1 heaped desertspoon miso paste
1 egg
Chop and boil the potatoes in plenty of water, until just tender, so a sharp knife can go in with ease but they don’t fall apart.
Meanwhile finely chop the onion and fry it gently in a small saucepan with some olive oil, until transparent.
Add the meat to the onion, stir now and them whilst the meat cooks through.
Add the stock cube to the meat and enough water to make a plentiful gravy.
Drain the potatoes.
Roll out 2/3 of the pastry, to a size that will comfortably line the base and sides of a buttered pie dish.
Line the dish with the pastry.
Spoon the potatoes into the pastry, follow with the meat, onion, chopped wild garlic and gravy.
Roll our the rest of the pastry, to make a nice pie top. Lay this over the filled pie, crimp it at the edges so it stats together during cooking and fork the top in several places, to slow steam to escape during cooking.
Beat the egg in a cup and brush the tip of the pie.
Cook on a preheated oven at 180°C for about 40 minutes, until the pie crust is a beautiful golden brown and your kitchen smells of wild garlic heaven!
This makes enough to serve 4 – 6, accompanied with vegetables such as carrots
The woodland floor in Frankendael Park is carpeted with flowering snowdrops and the emerging leaves of Ramsons (wild garlic, Allium ursinum). I’m sure snowdrops have their uses but when you find them, Ramsons are an urban herb forager’s dream. All parts of the plant are edible and very useful, though the leaves and flowers are all you should use. The bulbs should be left alone and only pick a leaf or two from any plant. They taste truly delicious – if you like the taste of garlic! They taste best, by far, before the pretty white flowers open and can be eaten from early spring, when the first leaves emerge from the soil.
Ramsons have similar properties to Garlic but are milder in all respects. They are also more tolerable to those you have difficulty digesting other members of the onions family.
Ramsons can be eaten raw or cooked and act as a gentle spring tonic.
They act as a gentle blood cleanser, stimulating the circulatory system and so benefiting the heart, memory, eye sight and skin.
They can be very helpful to those suffering from bowel problems, such as Crohn’s disease, IBS, colic, ulcerative colitis, flatulence, gas and bloating. They have a mild cleansing and calming effect and are said to balance gut flora.
They have mild antibacterial and antifungal properties, making them useful as a poultice for boils and minor cuts.
Until yesterday I had only eaten Ramsons as a spicy addition to salads and cheese sandwiches. Michael & Elodie at de Hortus told me about Ramson pesto last week so, after a quick afternoon forage, Ramson pesto and home made pasta was on the menu at my home last night.
The recipes I found for Ramson pesto called for a heap of leaves; fine if you live in the country and have access to huge swathes of Ramsons but I don’t. The Ramsons in city parks need to be shared by many and have more pressures to endure throughout the year. So today I picked twelve leaves and made enough pesto for two people – it was delicious and as you an see, the intense colour is striking.
Urban Ramson Pesto
6 Ramson leaves per person
Olive oil
10 Pine nuts per person (optional)
Pecorino or firm goats cheese (optional)
Gently but thoroughly wash the Ramson leaves. Pat them dry.
Chop as finely as possible, using a sharp knife.
Place chopped leaves in a small bowl and add enough olive oil to loosen them up and create a useful pesto type consistency.
Add finely chopped pine nuts and grated cheese if you like.
Use in salad dressings, as a pasta sauce and generally in cooking in place of garlic.
Urban Herbology 