Recipe: Wild Green Beetroot Salad

Ingredients:

Ingredients

Green Salad Finely Chopped, 2 medium sized beetroot grated, ½ small onion very finely chopped, Yellow Pepper finely chopped, Lightly Toasted Organic Falafels

Dressing - Cold Pressed Oil, Braggs Liquid Amino Acid (soya sauce), Salt.  
Mix all ingredients together and let sit for 10mins with a top on for flavours to infuse.

I enjoyed harvesting the very late and long awaited first edible greens to make this salad.  Young Cleavers, Ribwort Plantain and Navelwort I gathered on my walk.  Plantain & Cleavers are very common weeds that are not difficult to identify.  See Wild Foraging Video here to help identify.  From the garden I discovered Ramsons (wild garlic), Lemon Balm and Chives.  The farmers markets will have the first winter green salad bags available to sell also which can be used instead if you are not feeling the foraging just yet. 

Wild Greens

Now that spring is here green leaves are highly appropriate foods to both build & cleanse the blood & offer high nutrient value to our plate.  Sourcing good quality greens however is the key.  Supermarket greens are already many days old and exposed to heat & light by the time they arrive on the shelf.  Some are also irradiated (cold pasteurisation) before being sealed in plastic to extend their shelf life.  Supermarket greens therefore are nutrient poor to say the least in comparison to organic wild greens from the farmers market.  Better than any of these though are greens from the wild as they have not been hybridised and still contain bitter qualities.  The ancient wild relative of the modern lettuce contains a milky substance that acts like a narcotic similar to opium. This milky substance with a bitter taste also acts as a natural digestive and the Romans took advantage of it by eating it at the end of day to aid sleep.  Lactuca Virosa (Wild Lettuce) is a popular herb used as a sleep aid in herbal medicine.  Cleavers & Plantain are also important herbs for a herbalist & are excellent spring tonics.  

Siobhán Shinnors, Medical Herbalist has been working with Nutrition for over 20 years.