Mine entry, of course will have to be Common Milkweed or also called Asclepias syriaca.
I understand it can be confused to dogbane when in the shoot/sprout phase. By no means am I an expert, but from what I know of milkweed: its top viens are more prominent, leaves do not squeak when rubbed together, stem is slightly squared, stalk is hollow, and taste almost sweet.
Where dogbane, top veins are less prominent, leaves DO squeak when rubbed together, steam is more round, stalk is solid, and tastes very bitter.
So, what I gathered the young shoots/sprouts and the young leaves from the tops of some of the taller plants. Some did contain the broccoli like buds already. If the stem was getting woody, I peeled that off.
I then washed them throughly in water, while I heated a small pan with olive oil in it.
Then added the leaves/shoots to the pan and cooked for about 5 minutes, added salt/pepper/and a little garlic powder. Leaves turn bright green and started to blacken. The smell was awesome, kind of like brussel sprouts but not quite so cabbagly smelling.
I let cool for a moment and consumed! Wow were they good. I have heard some compare to green beans, I would say that is close, but more of an asparagus/green bean taste. The broccoli like clusters, tasted alot alike , you guessed it broccoli! (Can't wait to get some bigger ones!)
I then gathered up some milkweed pods and this is what I did with them. A smoked oyster, ramen, and milkweed stir fry of sorts, this time a little more bushy. As I cooked it over a fire in my 12cm zebra and iron frying pan.
1) what I used to make it with, all very easy to carry in my day pack, i even pack the cutting board. The oysters wont spoil and the ramen is cheap. i think I have about $2.00 in the whole meal!
2) Water on to boil for the ramen, and frying up the oysters, dont need to bring oil as they are packed in it already. I used the insert from the zebra to roast the milkweed pods
3) after the pods were good and roasted I cut up and added to the oysters
4) I forgot to take a picture of it, but I also added the noodles to the pan to fry alittle after they were done boiling.
5) Here is the finished product, I must say it is very tasty. The milkweed pods cooked this way taste alot like green bell peppers that have been roasted on the grill!! Very juicy as well. I will be eating this again!
Well, in my adventures in milkweed I tried another recipe. Bacon wrapped, cheese filled milkweed pods.
I must say they were AWESOME! I boiled the pods first then cut down the "seam" but not all the way thru, then removed the seed bundle. Chopped the seeds up and mixed those with the cream cheese and cheddar and then put it back into the pod. Then wrapping with half a piece of bacon and using a toothpick I had soaked in warm water(so they dont burn so easy)
Then placed them on the grill along with some other bacon wrapped goodies.
This is another I will be doing again. By the way I tried (2) without boiling first and they tasted the same, but were way too tough to eat, as in stringy.
To address the concerns of Common milkweed being toxic, i have read both ways and i believe for me at least it is not in the least bit toxic. As with all wild edibles know 100% what you are going to eat before you eat it. And even then sample it first before diving right in and pigging out just as other daily foods there is a chance you may just be allergic to somethings.
Since its too late in the season to eat them any more, I have turned to doing other things with them.
This time around I picked some pods, that first of all it has rained off and on all week here and then I soaked them in a bowl of room temp water. To see whether or not they would take a spark after the soaking.
As I already found out even if you pick them off when still green, let sit a few hours the fluff will light right up.
My reasoning behind this "test" was to see if as long as I didnt breach the outside of the pod if the seed fluff would stay dry. I let the pods soak for a coupel of hours then got down to business.
I know this would be a lot easier to follow on video, but I don't have a video camera. And the wifey wouldnt take pictures for me while I did it, so you will just have to fill in the missing parts yourself.
Soaking
Peeling back to get at the seeds
Fluffed up and ready to light, sorry hard to take a picture while you use the firesteel to light!
You have to really fluff them up so the air can get to them, but they took right off!
Well in my on going adventure in milkweed, next is cordage. I'm going to go into how to make cordage as there is alot of info out there on that subject already, but I will show how I prepped the milkweed for this purpose
First found some plants, didn't go far as they are in my backyard
Stripped the leaves off:
Peeled the "bark" of the stem off in strips, being careful at the stem knuckles:
Then you can make the cordage at this point, but I chose to wait until the next day and then soaked it in water before twisting
I don't know the name of the method, but i do know IA Woodsman showed me!
Then I sat down on the step and went at it, in about 30 minutes i made about 30 ft of cordage
Great stuff! I used some on this bird snare, worked very well
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