Dandelions Tastes Bitter But It Cures

from presscore: Dandelions are the fastest growing and one of the most nutritionally packed food on Earth. The dandelion is a herbaceous (a herb) perennial plant of the family Asteraceae (Compositae). Dandelions are flowers with medicinal properties yet we spend $millions every year to destroy them. Why do we spend so much time and effort to destroy this valuable herb if we also spent $millions each year to buy another herbaceous perennial plant of the same family Asteraceae called “marigold”? The answer is we’ve been brainwashed into regarding the dandelion as an unsightly weed when in fact it is a very fast growing and freely (100% free) available food and medicine (costs $0 to make) that just doesn’t treat illnesses and diseases it cures you of them. This herbal food costs nothing, in terms of time or money, to grow. There is no market value in a food that grows freely on every lawn around the World. There is however, a market value attached to destroying this free healing food – $billions are spent every year to make and disperse very toxic herbicides (anti-herb pesticides). Those herbicides not only kills this medicinal herb it kills us. How? When we spray herbicides to kill the dandelion the herbicide is absorbed by the soil with every rainfall and over time this very toxic saturation enters our fresh water supply and our food supply. Once it enters our drinking water supply we consume the toxic herbicide every time we drink a glass of water from out kitchen faucets or eat plants that have been irrigated with well water.

42 Flowers You Can Eat

from mnn: Adding flowers to your food can be a nice addition of color and flavor, but be sure to follow these tips for eating flowers safely.

The culinary use of flowers dates back thousands of years to the Chinese, Greek and Romans. Many cultures use flowers in their traditional cooking — think of squash blossoms in Italian food and rose petals in Indian food.

Adding flowers to your food can be a nice way to add color, flavor and a little whimsy. Some are spicy, and some herbacious, while others are floral and fragrant. The range is surprising.

It’s not uncommon to see flower petals used in salads, teas, and as garnish for desserts, but they inspire creative uses as well — roll spicy ones (like chive blossoms) into handmade pasta dough, incorporate floral ones into homemade ice cream, pickle flower buds (like nasturtium) to make ersatz capers, use them to make a floral simple syrup for use in lemonade or cocktails. (See a recipe for Dandelion Syrup here.) I once stuffed gladiolus following a recipe for stuffed squash blossoms — a little out-there, I know, but they were great. So many possibilities…