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I posted these a few years ago but since @Kevin L brought the subject up, I thought I would post it again.
Cattail Stir-fry

Gather your cattail leaves/shoots and pull off the tough/fibrous outer leaves until you reach the tender white inner core of the cattail heart. Wash them thoroughly and cut into roughly 4” pieces. Put a healthy amount of high-heat cooking oil in the bottom of your skillet. Put in your burdock root slices into the hot oil, which are cut diagonally about 1/8” thick, and cook for about 5 minutes. Then add chopped spring onion, carrots that have been cut into long strips (julienned), and the chopped burdock petioles. Cook about 3-5 minutes and then add cattail shoots, minced garlic, and minced ginger (you could use a small amount of wild ginger). Cook for about 3 minutes. Then add a few splashes of sesame seed oil, some black sesame seeds, chopped red cabbage, some finely chopped wild greens (we used sow thistle greens) and a lot of Bragg’s Liquid Aminos/soy sauce/tamari/shoyu. Cover and let cook for about a minute. Serve with Nettle/Sesame Powder sprinkled on top.

Source: Sunny Savage | Inviting the Wild Inside

Cattail-Wild Rice Pilaf
This recipe can be made with brown rice, but the wild rice adds a special dimension to it.
1 cup dry wild rice (4 cups cooked)
2 Tbsp sesame oil
½ cup chopped green onion
2 cups cattail shoots, sliced (about 30 cattails)
2 tsp salt
½ cup slivered almonds
1. Cook the wild rice until tender.
2. Sautee onion and cattail shoots in sesame oil until tender and translucent.
3. Mix the rice and the sautéd cattail shoots and onion together.
4. Add salt and slivered almonds.
5. Serve hot.

Cattail Wild-Rice Soup

1 cup dry wild rice (4 cups cooked)
2 Tbsp sesame oil
½ cup chopped green onion
2 cups cattail shoots, sliced (about 30 cattails)
2 tsp salt

1. Cook the wild rice until tender.
2. In a heavy-bottomed soup pot sauté onion and cattail shoots in sesame oil until tender and translucent.
3. Add the cooked wild rice, salt and 4 cups of chicken broth or other soup stock of choice.
4. Simmer together for 15-20 minutes and serve.

Cat-on-the-Cob with Garlic Butter

30-40 cattail flowerheads, peeled
Garlic butter:
½ cup unsalted butter
½ cup olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
12 garlic cloves, crushed
1 cup freshly chopped wild greens (or parsley or other fresh garden herbs)

Make garlic butter in a food processor by whipping the butter, oil, salt, fresh garlic and parsley together until smooth.
Note: If using salted butter, eliminate the salt from the recipe.
The olive oil makes the butter nice and creamy and spreadable, even after refrigerating. I like to make a batch of this to keep handy in the fridge. You can also make a larger batch ahead to freeze in small containers when the greens are in season.

1. Boil cattail flowerheads in water for 10 minutes
2. Make garlic butter in a food processor by whipping the butter, salt, fresh garlic and parsley together until smooth.
3. Drain the cattail flowerheads and slather them generously with the garlic butter.
4. Eat them just like miniature corn on the cobs.

Cattail Casserole

3 cups cattail flowerbuds, scraped off the “cobs” (about 40 flowerheads)
1 egg
¼ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp black pepper
½ cup milk
1 cup soft breadcrumbs
1 cup grated cheese

1. Cook cattail flowerheads in boiling water for 5-10 minutes.
2. Scrape the flowerbuds off the cob to make 3 cups.
3. Beat egg together with spices, milk and breadcrumbs.
4. Combine cattail flowers with the egg mixture.
5. In a greased bread pan or small casserole dish, spread half of cattail mixture on the bottom.
6. Add half of the grated cheese, spread the rest of the cattail mixture over, and top with the rest of the grated cheese.
7. Bake at 350° until lightly browned, about 30 minutes.

Cattail Flower Refrigerator Pickles

This recipe is adapted from Wildman Steve Brill’s book “Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants, who got it from his friends Dean and Gabi.
Enough cattail flowerheads to tightly fill a quart jar, about 30 or 40
4 garlic cloves, peeled
1 tsp whole black peppercorns
4 to 6 bay leaves
¾ cup apple cider vinegar (use some of your herbal vinegar!)
1½ cups olive oil
3 Tbsp salt
1¼ cups water

1. Boil the cattails in water for 5 to 10 minutes, and drain thoroughly.
2. Stuff flowerheads, garlic, peppercorns, and bay leaves into clean, sterile quart jar.
3. Combine vinegar, oil, water and salt in a saucepan.
4. Bring to a boil, remove from heat and pour over the cattail heads.
5. Add a little more oil, vinegar and water if the liquid does not reach to the top of the jar.
6. Cover and let marinate in the refrigerator overnight.
If you are experienced at making pickles, you could experiment with some of your favorite pickle recipes and put them up as preserves.

Cattail Pollen Pancakes

Cattail pollen pancakes are an experience you will never forget! They are absolutely delicious!
1 cup flour
1 cup cattail pollen
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
½ cup honey
¼ cup oil
2 cups milk

1. Mix dry ingredients together in a bowl.
2. Add eggs, honey, oil and milk and mix thoroughly.
3. If the batter seems to thick to pour, add more milk until it has a good pancake batter consistency.
4. Cook on a hot griddle until golden brown.

Cattail Pollen Biscuits

You’ll never be the same after eating these golden, melt-in-your-mouth biscuits, worth every minute of your time and effort in harvesting the cattail pollen. My secret for making light biscuits is to make the dough in a food processor.
1 cup white flour (wheat flour just doesn’t make ‘em light enough!)
1 cup cattail pollen
¼ cup butter
1 Tbsp honey or sugar
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
¾ cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 450 °.
2. Put flour, cattail pollen, salt and baking powder, and butter in a food processor and run on high until you have a course mixture. (If no food processor, cut with a fork or pastry cutter until mixture resembles fine crumbs.)
3. Add honey or sugar plus the milk and whiz just until the dough forms a lump. Do not overmix!
4. Shape into biscuits and bake on ungreased cookie sheet 10-12 minutes until golden brown.
You can make drop biscuits by increasing the milk to 1 cup and dropping by large spoonfuls until a cookie sheet.
Buttermilk biscuits: For the ultimate biscuit, substitute buttermilk for the milk, decrease baking powder to 2 tsp, and add ¼ tsp baking soda

Source: prodigalgardens.info - Misconfigured
 
Not only cattail there are many ornamental plants in the landscape that are edible and found in most yards. Hosta shoots, Daylily leaves bulbs and flowers, fiddle heads from ferns and bamboo shoots to name a few. With enough research when landscaping your property you can change out many of the normal landscaping trees and bushes for similar plants that in many cases are both native and produce edible crops.


Yes!! I joke with a lot of people that my “garden” is actually my secret store pile. Lol. It’s good to learn how to dry herbs and flowers properly as well. I keep them in mason jars and throw an oxygen absorber in to keep bugs out. One of my favorite subjects to read is herbalist and horticulture survival techniques.
 
And they are to stupid to figure it out! I have never understood "WHO", a supposed staff of scientist and such and they can't figure we are overpopulated? They can damn well say deer and other animals are overpopulated but Not people? The same goes with global warming, all the tree cutting and laying of concrete and asphalt, add in shingles and More people and cars gives you global warming! I am Not a rocket scientist but even I can figure that out! OK, no more ranting, the powers to be will not here me or pay any attention to me anyways! :(
Might be helpful if our next boatload of handout food contained birth control powder mixed in.
 
I posted these a few years ago but since @Kevin L brought the subject up, I thought I would post it again.
Cattail Stir-fry

Gather your cattail leaves/shoots and pull off the tough/fibrous outer leaves until you reach the tender white inner core of the cattail heart. Wash them thoroughly and cut into roughly 4” pieces. Put a healthy amount of high-heat cooking oil in the bottom of your skillet. Put in your burdock root slices into the hot oil, which are cut diagonally about 1/8” thick, and cook for about 5 minutes. Then add chopped spring onion, carrots that have been cut into long strips (julienned), and the chopped burdock petioles. Cook about 3-5 minutes and then add cattail shoots, minced garlic, and minced ginger (you could use a small amount of wild ginger). Cook for about 3 minutes. Then add a few splashes of sesame seed oil, some black sesame seeds, chopped red cabbage, some finely chopped wild greens (we used sow thistle greens) and a lot of Bragg’s Liquid Aminos/soy sauce/tamari/shoyu. Cover and let cook for about a minute. Serve with Nettle/Sesame Powder sprinkled on top.

Source: Sunny Savage | Inviting the Wild Inside

Cattail-Wild Rice Pilaf
This recipe can be made with brown rice, but the wild rice adds a special dimension to it.
1 cup dry wild rice (4 cups cooked)
2 Tbsp sesame oil
½ cup chopped green onion
2 cups cattail shoots, sliced (about 30 cattails)
2 tsp salt
½ cup slivered almonds
1. Cook the wild rice until tender.
2. Sautee onion and cattail shoots in sesame oil until tender and translucent.
3. Mix the rice and the sautéd cattail shoots and onion together.
4. Add salt and slivered almonds.
5. Serve hot.

Cattail Wild-Rice Soup

1 cup dry wild rice (4 cups cooked)
2 Tbsp sesame oil
½ cup chopped green onion
2 cups cattail shoots, sliced (about 30 cattails)
2 tsp salt

1. Cook the wild rice until tender.
2. In a heavy-bottomed soup pot sauté onion and cattail shoots in sesame oil until tender and translucent.
3. Add the cooked wild rice, salt and 4 cups of chicken broth or other soup stock of choice.
4. Simmer together for 15-20 minutes and serve.

Cat-on-the-Cob with Garlic Butter

30-40 cattail flowerheads, peeled
Garlic butter:
½ cup unsalted butter
½ cup olive oil
½ teaspoon salt
12 garlic cloves, crushed
1 cup freshly chopped wild greens (or parsley or other fresh garden herbs)

Make garlic butter in a food processor by whipping the butter, oil, salt, fresh garlic and parsley together until smooth.
Note: If using salted butter, eliminate the salt from the recipe.
The olive oil makes the butter nice and creamy and spreadable, even after refrigerating. I like to make a batch of this to keep handy in the fridge. You can also make a larger batch ahead to freeze in small containers when the greens are in season.

1. Boil cattail flowerheads in water for 10 minutes
2. Make garlic butter in a food processor by whipping the butter, salt, fresh garlic and parsley together until smooth.
3. Drain the cattail flowerheads and slather them generously with the garlic butter.
4. Eat them just like miniature corn on the cobs.

Cattail Casserole

3 cups cattail flowerbuds, scraped off the “cobs” (about 40 flowerheads)
1 egg
¼ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp black pepper
½ cup milk
1 cup soft breadcrumbs
1 cup grated cheese

1. Cook cattail flowerheads in boiling water for 5-10 minutes.
2. Scrape the flowerbuds off the cob to make 3 cups.
3. Beat egg together with spices, milk and breadcrumbs.
4. Combine cattail flowers with the egg mixture.
5. In a greased bread pan or small casserole dish, spread half of cattail mixture on the bottom.
6. Add half of the grated cheese, spread the rest of the cattail mixture over, and top with the rest of the grated cheese.
7. Bake at 350° until lightly browned, about 30 minutes.

Cattail Flower Refrigerator Pickles

This recipe is adapted from Wildman Steve Brill’s book “Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants, who got it from his friends Dean and Gabi.
Enough cattail flowerheads to tightly fill a quart jar, about 30 or 40
4 garlic cloves, peeled
1 tsp whole black peppercorns
4 to 6 bay leaves
¾ cup apple cider vinegar (use some of your herbal vinegar!)
1½ cups olive oil
3 Tbsp salt
1¼ cups water

1. Boil the cattails in water for 5 to 10 minutes, and drain thoroughly.
2. Stuff flowerheads, garlic, peppercorns, and bay leaves into clean, sterile quart jar.
3. Combine vinegar, oil, water and salt in a saucepan.
4. Bring to a boil, remove from heat and pour over the cattail heads.
5. Add a little more oil, vinegar and water if the liquid does not reach to the top of the jar.
6. Cover and let marinate in the refrigerator overnight.
If you are experienced at making pickles, you could experiment with some of your favorite pickle recipes and put them up as preserves.

Cattail Pollen Pancakes

Cattail pollen pancakes are an experience you will never forget! They are absolutely delicious!
1 cup flour
1 cup cattail pollen
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
2 eggs
½ cup honey
¼ cup oil
2 cups milk

1. Mix dry ingredients together in a bowl.
2. Add eggs, honey, oil and milk and mix thoroughly.
3. If the batter seems to thick to pour, add more milk until it has a good pancake batter consistency.
4. Cook on a hot griddle until golden brown.

Cattail Pollen Biscuits

You’ll never be the same after eating these golden, melt-in-your-mouth biscuits, worth every minute of your time and effort in harvesting the cattail pollen. My secret for making light biscuits is to make the dough in a food processor.
1 cup white flour (wheat flour just doesn’t make ‘em light enough!)
1 cup cattail pollen
¼ cup butter
1 Tbsp honey or sugar
3 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
¾ cup milk

1. Preheat oven to 450 °.
2. Put flour, cattail pollen, salt and baking powder, and butter in a food processor and run on high until you have a course mixture. (If no food processor, cut with a fork or pastry cutter until mixture resembles fine crumbs.)
3. Add honey or sugar plus the milk and whiz just until the dough forms a lump. Do not overmix!
4. Shape into biscuits and bake on ungreased cookie sheet 10-12 minutes until golden brown.
You can make drop biscuits by increasing the milk to 1 cup and dropping by large spoonfuls until a cookie sheet.
Buttermilk biscuits: For the ultimate biscuit, substitute buttermilk for the milk, decrease baking powder to 2 tsp, and add ¼ tsp baking soda

Source: prodigalgardens.info - Misconfigured
Thank you for elaborating on my cattail point (I'm not being sarcastic and/or patronizing). I wasn't aware of the recipes, as I've only studied wild plants in the context of bushcraft and cooking over a campfire and/or in a dutch oven.

I have a surprising edible plant that grows all over Ocala and Marion County: Prickly pear cactus! The sweet fruits taste like a cross between a watermellon and a strawberry with just a hint of kiwi. People have fermented and distilled alcohol from the juice rendered from the fruit, the large pads taste like string beans when cut in strips and fried, steamed, boiled, or roasted.

I haven't looked it up, but I'll bet anything that the dark fruit juice is an antioxidant super-food.

And so on.
 
Thank you for elaborating on my cattail point (I'm not being sarcastic and/or patronizing). I wasn't aware of the recipes, as I've only studied wild plants in the context of bushcraft and cooking over a campfire and/or in a dutch oven.

I have a surprising edible plant that grows all over Ocala and Marion County: Prickly pear cactus! The sweet fruits taste like a cross between a watermellon and a strawberry with just a hint of kiwi. People have fermented and distilled alcohol from the juice rendered from the fruit, the large pads taste like string beans when cut in strips and fried, steamed, boiled, or roasted.

I haven't looked it up, but I'll bet anything that the dark fruit juice is an antioxidant super-food.

And so on.
I have no plans or desire to eat cactus or cattails. But it’s a good bet to have the knowledge to be aware that you can if you’re caught in a bad situation.
 
Yes!! I joke with a lot of people that my “garden” is actually my secret store pile. Lol. It’s good to learn how to dry herbs and flowers properly as well. I keep them in mason jars and throw an oxygen absorber in to keep bugs out. One of my favorite subjects to read is herbalist and horticulture survival techniques.

Same here I just finished an herbal medicine course online myself. Not only do I harvest from my vegetable gardens and fruit trees but make salves and dried teas all from what I gather mostly from my own property.
 
I have a surprising edible plant that grows all over Ocala and Marion County: Prickly pear cactus!
YES!! I have no idea how it got here but we found a patch of PRICKLY PEAR CACTUS here in Hungary!! We tried the fruit last year and it was great. We will find some of the plants which survived the winter well and transplant them to our garden for future uses for vitamins and edibles....can't wait. GP
 
Might be helpful if our next boatload of handout food contained birth control powder mixed in.
That would be hilarious! Great also, to bad it will never happen! Just like teaching these third world beings to stop pooping and peeing in there drinking water, or teach them how to grow their own food, or how to raise cattle, chickens and such, involves to much common sense to Really help them!
 
Prickly pear jelly is really good. We had that cactus all over in New Mexico.
They raise them on a limited scale commercially in California. I stopped the car when driving by one farm and asked them for a cutting. They said they had never, ever done this and I guess their plants were kind of secret.
 
They raise them on a limited scale commercially in California. I stopped the car when driving by one farm and asked them for a cutting. They said they had never, ever done this and I guess their plants were kind of secret.
There are many domestic varieties and agricultural hybrids . . . which shocked me, as I wasn't even aware that this humble cactus--with stunningly beautiful flowers, by the way--had even been truly cultivated like any other domestic plant.
 
This is what I mean, although I've seen blue, blush pink, and deep red cactus flowers.

It's awful when people call the desert a "God-forsaken wasteland . . . " and can't see and appreciate that which is beautiful when it's right in front of them.
download.jpeg
 
Prickly Pear is one of the first plants you look for in the desert for a food and water source. The barrel cactus also. When its almost round, it is full of water. When its skin is very zig-zag, then it is drying out. You can cut the top off and eat the inside for water, tastes like Elmers glue but it is water...
 
Prickly Pear is one of the first plants you look for in the desert for a food and water source. The barrel cactus also. When its almost round, it is full of water. When its skin is very zig-zag, then it is drying out. You can cut the top off and eat the inside for water, tastes like Elmers glue but it is water...
I tried it once, and I question how much benefit (water-wise) I got from doing this to an ancient, semi-protected plant . . . and I felt utterly awful.

I've used solar stills to accumulate water during a disaster, and I've found that they work well.

solar-still-1024x683.jpg


I add a large syringe-style turkey baster to the emergency kit, so I can suck up the water through the tube, and squirt it into a canteen or some other kind of clean water bottle or other container.
 
You can wrap a large trash bag around a small bush or pull one up over a large tree branch, tie it off to close it up and let the sun shine on it for a while. The water in the branches and leaves will evaporate and collect inside the bag which you can remove and drain. Only once per bush to not kill it tho.....Even an empty coke bottle stuffed with grass and left in the sun will give you a swallow of water in the same way. Hang up sheet metal or glass and let them get warm daily...they will cool off and collect condensation at night and if hung on an angle, the water will run off and drip into your container. We ran a long strip of wire between trees to collect dew and let it drip into a container also. Never forget to sop up the dew from the grass and off of rocks early each day and wring your towel into a container for emergency water...GP
 

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