The Prepping Thread - A Newer Beginning ;)

[Deleted User]

Hard steel? like GQ's trowel or sheer determination from you?

DigForVictory

Do you suppose a curry sauce applied to the unloved bits of the allotment would either fend off the squishy things or make the leafy stuff more palatable?

Says she still profoundly unconvinced by the idea of nettle soup.

[Deleted User]

Oooohhh D for V look up the old Viking recipe for nettle soup, DD1 and I had some made to the old recipe when we went to the Viking Exhibition at the British Museum in London a few years ago and it was absolutely delicious, topped with loads of chopped fresh herbs and chopped hard boiled egg, worth a try and far nicer than you'd think.

DigForVictory

You know me far too well! My Inner Toddler is easily coaxed into toddling after my Inner Historian & I happily confess this recipe for nettle soup does look distinctly palatable. Plus my respect for the British Museum (already high) has gone up another notch - how better to convince you these wicked barbarians might have had their moments than by sharing their culinary delights?

Albeit some of me is murmuring that with the eggs & the herbs, & a nice bouillon, I might try to pass it off as a light soup followed by an omelette aux fines herbes & omit the nettle & the viking bit wholly, but it might not feed 4 & certainly not 4 of us hearty trencherfolk. So better to have a viking nettle soup & then try their green soup with leeks double cream & nutmeg another day. (Same webpage...)

Eeeh these warrior folk knew how to live according to what they had scavenged that day! I'll bet they had several winning ways with seaweed too, but I'm too far from the coast (& dangerously ignorant as well) to experiment.

[Deleted User]

Try it half and half nettles and spinach the first time you make it D for V the recipe looks very similar to what we had (we chatted to the chef) and make sure you use a good stock to boost the flavour, ham/gammon stock is really nice. I've made it with all nettles and it's very 'Green' tasting which I quite like but the flavour with spinach is gentler and somehow more familiar to the modern palate. If you like the nettles, gradually use a larger proportion of nettles to spinach until you find the balance you like. It's an age old blood purifier for spring eating after a winter on dried and preserved foods that are vitamin depleted.....those Vikings knew a thing or three.....

[Deleted User]

All seaweeds in British waters are edible, some are reported to be more palatable than others though and I don't have knowledge of which are the nicest. I do however absolutely adore the seaweed salad they serve in Yo Sushi if that's any help?

Siebrie

Maybe start out with nettle tea? Just pop about 5 rinsed nettle tips (top 5 small leaves) into a mug and pour boiling water over it.

I used to drink this every day in February, and will start again next February. The second and third week I would burst out in spots and my skin would look dreadful, but from the fourth week, it would feel really soft and look amazing. If I remember correctly, it was advised to not use it for more than a month when drank daily.

Would anyone know a reliable website where I can find which flowers are edible? For instance, pansies are edible, but are all pansies/violas edible? F1 hybrids?

In other news: on the Belgian news they said that there is a surplus of British breakfast sausages, because the Belgian pork factories had prepared for Brexit, so a lot should be flooding the British market soon. Time to keep an eye out and stock up!

DigForVictory

I don't doubt the edibility, it's the possible contamination that worries me a little.

Still, next beach day out, along with brewkit for hot chocolate (family sovereign remedy for windchill, & sand in the crannies), I'll take a pan, a pat of butter, garlic & black pepper. Then site the chaps as windbreak so whatever I cook/heat/scare/burn hasn't got sand in it as well...

I will then lug some home so I can try it under slightly more controlled circs.! Tho it may need protection from family who recall seaweed as compost from their Cornish granny's wartime tales.

<mentally rummaging freezer - have we got a good ham stock in? And if so how, as it makes all veg soup more tolerable to the young!>

[Deleted User]

Knor do a ham stock cube that is almost (not quite but almost) as good as home made.

DigForVictory

I have not forgotten the year both parents bought a turkey & m'father bought a ham hock that led me to decide I did not want to meet the critters mother. It was Huge, & bigger than the marmelade pan.

When Dad had earned mum's forgiveness (she made him soak the ham til its packing salt was All Gone, about 7 hours & 4 changes of water as she calmly read the papers, wrote a letter or two etc), she cooked it, we served it sliced for both their work parties & then mum made stock with the bone & the shreds of meat left.

We daughters had been hesitant about eating All Our Veggies before then. With ham stock, we would eat pints of green soup without question...