The St. George’s mushrooms (vårfagerhatt) come up every year under the old birch tree next to my sitting place in the garden. They weren’t really growing much more in the heat and drought, so they were harvested for a little lunch stir-fry with fresh asparagus and the last of the heirloom shallots (Finland) from storage.
13th June 2020 perennial greens were stir-fried and served with quinoa and served with Allium ursinum flowers. Allium validum (swamp or Pacific onion) with flower shoot Saxifraga pensylvanica (swamp saxifrage) Gunnera tinctoria Asparagus officinalis (asparges) Crambe maritima (sea kale / strandkål broccolis) Perennial kale “Walsall Allotments” (flerårig kål) Campanula latifolia (giant bellflower / storklokke) Aster macrophyllus (big-leaf aster) flowering shoots of various Russian Rumex acetosa cultivars (sorrel / engsyre)
From the top: Allium validum (swamp onion); Saxifraga pensylvanica (swamp saxifrage); Gunnera tinctoria; Asparagus; Sea kale (Crambe maritima); Perennial kale “Walsall Allotments”; Campanula latifolia (giant bellflower); (right) Aster macrophyllus (big-leaf aster) and (left) flowering shoots of various Russian sorrel cultivars (Rumex acetosa)
…with the Gunnera petioles peeled (the outer reddish layer is slightly bitter) and Allium validum flowering shoot
The greens were stir-fried with chili and garlic and served with Norwegian organic quinoa with ramsons (ramsløk) flowers:
I noticed in a recent number (3/2017) of the Norwegian Useful Plants excellent magazine “Sopp og Nyttevekster” a picture on page 41 (picture) accompanying a recipe for “Spring risotto with wild asparagus, sorrel and peas”, but I noticed a familiar plant in the picture which I don’t think is wild aspargus (Asparagus spp.) but rather another one of the 80 plants in my book, Ornithogalum pyrenaicum (Bath asparagus, aspargette in France or Latte di gallina dei Pirenei in Italy). This plant is in the lily family….and is commonly used over its wild range which stretches from the Caucasus through the Mediterranean countries as far north as the UK, where it may have been introduced by the Romans for food near to the city of Bath.
It’s noted in the article that wild asparagus was served to the Norwegian king and queen on their 80th birthdays….but it’s unclear if the picture is of this dish?
This isn’t the first time this species has turned up in Norway as my friend Ove Fosså told me a few years ago that he had found Ornithogalum pyrenaicum being sold as asparagus in a supermarket in Sandnes (Stavanger) and that he’d also noticed it captioned as asparagus in Norwegian chef Eyvind Hellstrøm’s cookbook Bageteller…thanks to Ove Fosså for this picture:
Ove also noticed it on the pizza of a cheesemaker friend “Lise Brunborg ( the cheesemaker who makes the great blue cheese Fønix in Stavanger). It turned out, she had it from her parents’ fridge and they had bought it at Madla Handelslag, a cooperative in Stavanger:
I was saddened to see in yesterday’s Adressa (local paper) that Trøndelags grand old asparagus farmer has died
As part of my project for the Norwegian Genetic Resource Centre documenting and collecting old Norwegian vegetables, I received a tip about a retired farmer, Jan Lein, who had supposedly grown asparagus commercially on Tautra (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tautra), a historic island which I can just see from my house on the other side of the Trondheimsfjorden. The fact that the island is surrounded by relatively warm water in winter makes for a mild climate and early spring. The island and surrounding area is known as Trondheim’s vegetable garden!
I called Lein and agreed to meet him at his house on 17th October 2010. I met a really nice man who was proud of his pioneering work with asparagus on Tautra which he believed started in the early 1960s. He told me that he even grew organically with seaweed as fertiliser and he grew white asparagus by mounding the plants with earth. In his house, there were a number of pictures on the walls of his vegetables, including asparagus! The plants themselves derived from seed bought from Leuthens Seed Catalogue in Trondheim. He sold on the market in Trondheim for a number of years until his local production was outcompeted by imported asparagus Her grew about 12-13 different vegetables at that time!
Jan showed me this plant nearby which was one of the original plants
RIP Jan Lein, the northernmost Asparagus grower in the world?
The pictures below were photographed on his wall:
After my weekend course in Haugaland, member of Norwegian Seed Savers, Tone Lise Østboe kindly showed me around gardens in Stavanger and we also visited Rogaland arboretum outside the city and also a producer of bumble bees for the greenhouse industry!
Thanks very much Tone Lise :)
The stairs up to the flat I’d been loaned for my stay :) I hope I don’t sleepwalk :)
Tone Lise was one of the first to receive seed from Paolo in Italy who had crossed our Dagnøytral Jerusalem Artichoke with wild JAs in Italy and her flower heads were full of seed! I’ve never seen so much JA seed produced in Norway and Stavanger isn’t teh warmest part of Norway :) Let’s hope these are viable seed!
Tone Lise’s seed were darker than the original seed I received from Paolo, seen in this pictrue.
The tubers on Tone Lise’s plants were not worth keeping, inheriting the wild genes…
Soya beans +++
Tomatillo and Peony seed
My first taste of African Sukuma Wiki kale….some varieties are perennial….
Tone Lise tried to defeat me with this super chili hot pizza, but failed…it was delicious!
Interesting brussel sprout seed head which had developed sprouts…is this common?
Swelling ovaries on Tone Lise’s Elephant Garlic!!
A tree in the street where Tone Lise lives has the tallest dandelion ever growing out of it ;)
The arboretum was disappointing….that an oil town can’t afford to make a good arboretum is very sad….
The arboretum…
We visited a producer and breeder of bumble bees (Bombus terrestris) for pollinating in greenhouses…
Multi-colour pollen from different plant species!
Tone Lise has a “kolonihage” (allotment with small cottage) here
Kolonihagen
All the street names are vegetables—blomkålveien = Cauliflower Way
I wonder if this is Aralia spinosa? It remebles Aralia elata, but that one is already in seed in my garden. Does spinosa flower later?
Aralia spinosa?
Turnip Way…
Tone Lise lives on Asparagus Way…
…and she has asparagus in the front of her garden :)
A lot of work has gone into developing the garden with masses of organic matter…
Tone Lise is now the main guardian in Norway of Herrgårds artichoke! Artichoke is most likely to survive the winter in Stavanger…I sent this to her this spring!
Tone Lise’s Artemisia annua plantation, inspired by a stay in Africa
A strange long-leaved kale, probably deriving from one of Chris Homanic’s perennial kale mixes
Tone Lise’s garden is sadly far and above the most productive garden here, most people growing no food at all….
Lablab bean in the greenhouse…
Tone Lise has a good taste in reading material in her greenhouse
A neighbour has a monkey puzzle tree, a good indication of a mild winter climate!
Tree tomatoes…but they don’t smell strongly like my plants did…why?
It’s forbidden to use Round-up in Stavanger and this also applies to allotments!
..and to end the day, a look through Tone Lise’s seed collection including several packets of unknown seed from Africa! These both seem to be cultivars of Solanum nigrum or similar, an important leafy green vegetable in Africa!
Just before the start of my first course for MAJOBO on Tuesday, I decided to change my first picture to something of local relevance! This is Oslo’s oldest asparagus bed, perhaps as old as 100 years as explained in the following article!
In another one of these resonant moments, who should be amongst the 20 participants than the owner of this very garden, Lars Mjøset :) He walked in just after I took this picture!
Perennial vegetables, Edimentals (plants that are edible and ornamental) and other goings on in The Edible Garden
