Forage for Wood Sorrel, Oxalis acetosella



All through Dunedin you can find a large number of edibles around. I make good use of them. There are many plants you can forage for and most of them taste pretty good. One of the tastiest is a plant called wood sorrel Oxalis acetosella.

Wood sorrel is found everywhere poking out from under hedges along a shady road and finds its way into every part of my garden here in Dunedin. It happens to be my absolute favorite weed to forage. I will admit many weeds you can forage for have uninteresting or somewhat unpalatable flavors,  but wood sorrel is truly tasty. Its got the tang of lemon with a floral flavor and is brilliant raw as well as in teas. The leaves and flowers are the parts I've personally eaten and I often go out to hunt for them. A welcome addition to any salad greens or on their own. The Leaves are a bit hit or miss in my experience. It depends where the plants are growing (or maybe its because clumps of plants with similar genes grow together). Either way, I have not had a nibble that tastes bad, just more or less bitter.

The plant itself looks a bit like a clover and is mistaken for it easily. If you take a close look you should have no problems distinguishing them. The leave look like folded hearts, unlike clovers, where the leaves are oval with a white chevron on them. The flowers are singular, where the clovers have many flowers shaped into a ball. Clover grows in colonies connected by runners like strawberry's and the wood sorrel grows independently of its neighbors but close together.

Resources:
Wood sorrel Wikipedia Page

No comments:

Post a Comment

Please Leave a Comment