flower
Foraging Nasturtium
Peppery leaves & flowers year-round here; green seed pods in spring/summer.
What to do with it
- Toss peppery leaves & flowers into salad
- Stuff the flowers
- Blend leaves into a pesto
Ways to keep it
- 'Poor man's capers' — brine the seed pods (ferment)
- Vinegar-pickle the pods
- Flower-infused vinegar
About Nasturtium
Tropaeolum , commonly known as nasturtium (; literally "nose-twister" or "nose-tweaker"), is a genus of roughly 80 species of annual and perennial herbaceous flowering plants. It was named by Carl Linnaeus in his book Species Plantarum and is the only genus in the family Tropaeolaceae. The nasturtiums received their common name because they produce an oil similar to that of watercress (Nasturtium officinale). The genus Tropaeolum, native to South and Central America, includes several very popular garden plants, the most common being T. majus, T. peregrinum and T. speciosum. One of the hardiest species is T. polyphyllum from Chile, the perennial roots of which can survive the winter underground at elevations of 3,300 metres (11,000 ft). Plants in this genus have showy, often intensely bright flowers and rounded, peltate (shield-shaped) leaves with the petiole in the centre. The flowers are bisexual and zygomorphic, with five petals, a superior three-carpelled ovary, and a funnel-shaped nectar spur at the back, formed by modification of one of the five sepals.
From Wikipedia.
Tree and plant locations come from Falling Fruit, a volunteer-run map of the urban harvest, used under CC BY-NC-SA 4.0. This project is non-commercial. Locations are crowd-sourced and provided as-is — always confirm a plant's identity and that you're welcome to pick before foraging.
Photos and descriptions from Wikipedia / Wikimedia Commons. Maps © OpenStreetMap contributors. Not affiliated with Falling Fruit, Wikimedia, or OpenStreetMap.