Transcription
Did you know that America has a wild plant that produces delicious edible tubers that can grow as large as a potato without anybody ever tending to them? One that grows across the entire country. This is fairy potato. And in this video, I'm going to show you everything that you need to know to find them and eat them.
This plant is one of America's most forgotten wild foods. Hundreds of thousands of people walk by them every single year, and they have no idea what they're missing. The entire plant is edible from the beautiful flowers to the succulent leaves all the way down to these underground tubers. And they offer this very unique opportunity to effectively create like a wild food battery right in your very own yard. But now I'm getting ahead of myself.
First, let's go over our agenda today. One, I'll show you how to identify them with confidence and distinguish them from lookalikes. Two, we'll cover where Oh, hey pup. Hey, buddy. Hey. Two, we'll cover where and when to find them. Three, how to gather the above ground parts and dig the underground tubers. Four, how to cook them to make them absolutely delicious. And finally, I'll show you secrets that I haven't seen anyone else talk about to go from finding some that are maybe about this big right here all the way up to the big guys. My name is Jesse. This is Feral Foraging. Let's begin.
As always, we cover a lot of information in my videos. And so, you don't have to worry about memorizing all of it, I've made this downloadable fair foraging guide just for you. Now, let's begin.
First, what actually even is fairy potato? And why does this little wildflower plant even make a potato-like tuber in the first place? The answer lies in its unique survival strategy. Fairy potato, also known as spring beauty, are what's called a spring ephemeral wildflower. They take advantage of a time of the year where conditions are ideal for them to grow before the trees have fully leafed out yet, but warm enough for them to do their thing. They flower, they reproduce, and then they die back. By the summertime, when it's hotter and drier, they've completely retreated underground. So, they need an energy storage system to make it all the way through the rest of the year until next spring. That energy store is the tuber that we'll be foraging for today.
Spring beauty is in the Clatonia group or genus. There are actually many wild edible plants in this group that a lot of you might be familiar with, like miners lettuce, but not all of them produce the tubers. I'll show you which ones do a little bit later. The spring beauty that I'm showcasing in this video today is what's commonly called the spring beauty clonia vica.
Here are some of the above ground parts that we can use to identify them confidently. And then after that, I'll show you a few look alikes that I want you to be aware of. Spring beauty grows in large to small clusters. The leaves are very narrow and grass-like, and they come off towards the base of the stem at the same point. But to me, it's these very showy flowers that are by far the easiest detail to go by. The flowers have five petals on them, and they range in color from almost completely white all the way to dark purple. The petals on the inside usually have these kind of vein-like streaks that go from the center all the way out to the edges that are usually pinkish in hue, but again, they are sometimes very light, other times really dark.
There are two main habitats that you're most likely to find them in. Either rich woodlands or open fields. We'll talk more about their habitat in a second, but first, there's a couple semi-oalikes that you could encounter depending on which habitat you find them in. In a woodland setting, you may come across a plant that also has five petals called false rue anemone. But this one's leaves are completely different to spring beauty when you look at them side by side. They are loed and they are not nearly as long.
In a more open field setting, you'll likely encounter both a plant called Star of Bethlehem, which is toxic, as well as a plant right here, which is called crows poison. And funny enough, that one is not toxic. I've eaten it on many occasions. And actually, a lot of the time when I'm out looking for spring beauty, I'll be gathering some of crow's poison to eat as well. But either way, these are very easy to tell apart. Both of those look alikes have flowers with visibly six petals on them versus the five petals of spring beauty. And also underneath they have a bulb, not a tuber.
Okay, now that we know how to identify them, we actually need to go out and find them, which is quite easy if you know both the right places to look and the right time when they're actually up. As I talked about before, you can find them in a woodland setting, but most of the time they're not really going to be thriving that much there. You'll find them in tiny patches here and there. Where I find them in really large numbers, huge numbers, is in big open fields and also sometimes in a good old-fashioned American lawn. I mean, just look at this image right here. Look at how this whole field is absolutely covered with them. How beautiful is that?
Within open fields, I also find that they tend to do a little bit better in more wet conditions. But that may be for somewhat indirect reasons. And it's here to me where we discover that in America we could have orders of magnitude more spring beauty than we do right now. My theory for why you'll find them more in more wet areas versus other ones isn't just because they seem to like that, although they do, but also because it prevents them from being mowed very low to the ground in early spring when they're out. So, all that we need to do to have more spring beauty around is just to wait a little bit longer after they've set their seed to start mowing in the springtime. You can still have your lawn if that's something that you care about. just don't mow it very early. It's very much like how people will put daffodils in the middle of their yard. They come up in spring and they die back before you start mowing. Exact same concept, except with daffodil bulbs, those are toxic. So, for me, I would much rather have edible tubers in my yard than toxic ones. The second thing, and this obviously goes without saying, that you shouldn't be spraying herbicides in your yard. That would kill them, too.
Can you imagine how beautiful it would be if an entire neighborhood every spring were filled with these incredible flowers with the buzzing of native bees going after them like the spring beauty bee which only feeds on the nectar of spring beauty. And you can jumpst start this process by transplanting them which is very very easy to do. Trust me if I can do it then you can too. But what kind of spring beauty you bring to your yard if you care about the food side of it is important. A little more on that a bit later.
Back to finding them. It is no secret that these guys are found in the spring. That's where they get their name from. Technically, you could dig the tubers up any time of the year, but if you don't have any above ground parts to use as indicators of where they are, that'll be really difficult. So, the easiest time by far is when they are flowering, which is why I always put the flower timing on my interactive foragers calendar. This right here is what the row would look like for spring beauty. And remember, the calendar has timings like this for dozens of other wild food species as well.
In terms of the range of spring beauty in North America and its cousins, there are two different zones you'll find them in. First we have again the spring beauty Clatonia vica which is in central and eastern North America. We also have in that part of the country Clatonia Caroliniana in East North America but in the west we have Clatonia Lancada which can be used the same way as I'll be showing you in this video.
Quick addendum. I've done more research on the actual taxonomy of spring beauty and I believe that all the members of the section Clatonia within the group Clatonia can likely be used the same way that I'm showing you in this video. The three that I've shown you already are the most abundant, but it does bring in a fourth one which is Majarine Spring Beauty in Colorado in the Southwest. Two important caveats for this one. Outside of the ones that I've specifically mentioned, I can't guarantee that you can use them in this way. You'd want to consult with a local expert. But two, some of these species like Ozark spring beauty are extremely rare. Endemic species like that one is only found in three counties in Arkansas. And in that case, I can't recommend that you dig the tubers of those. Now, this gets into the concept of responsible harvest, which we'll talk about in the next section.
Now comes what I consider to be the fun part, which is actually getting to be out there interacting with them. If you're just gathering the above ground parts of the plant, uh you could literally just use your fingers and pull them off or a knife. Very quick aside, this is me from the future. I wanted to add that if you are out gathering the greens, you do want to be on the lookout for a rust fungus that can grow on the plant that is aptly named spring beauty rust. One, you probably don't want to be eating any of the infected leaves, but two, they look really, really cool. To me, they make the plant look like they're kind of these squid tentacles coming out of the ground. Very strange, but again, very cool. That's everything back together.
But if you are digging the tubers, then you definitely want to have a hand shovel with you or what I use is a tool called a horih hory, a digging knife. First, because we are actually going to be digging and removing plants, we want to make sure that we are being mindful of the populations in the area that we are doing this. You don't want to take them from spots where you're only finding a few of them. You want to get them from areas where they are really, really thriving. Ideally, you get them from middle portions of them, not at the edges to help them to continue to spread out. And in my opinion, I think you shouldn't take any more than 10% if you're actually digging up the tubers.
You want to be looking for clusters where it appears that there are more stems that are coming from one point. They'll often kind of point towards the tuber based on how they enter into the ground. Once you find a nice clump of them, take your digging knife and then go about 4 in back and dig straight down and then press the shovel back. I usually dig in two places kind of 90° separated from one another. And that way I can lift up the soil, tip it over, and then access the tuber underneath. I do find that in more wet fields, not only are they doing better, but also the tubers tend to grow a little bit more shallow in the ground, so they're much easier to access.
If you want to cook them, I'd recommend getting about a handful or so to experiment with. In my experience, I've been able to gather about half a pound of tubers in just half an hour. And that's with me being very judicious and selective of which ones that I'm gathering up because I don't want to harm the populations. If I actually were in a dire situation and I was very hungry, I think I easily could have doubled the amount that I would be able to get. And most of what I got is for transplanting. I'm kind of setting them up in my garden right here because thankfully I am not in a dire situation right now.
To transplant them, I usually remove the existing above ground parts of it when I do this. And then at their new home, I will dig a hole that's about 3 in deep or so, ideally not too compacted, and then I'll just drop them in and cover them up. Next season, you should be greeted with a beautiful flush of them in the spring to enjoy, and they can slowly take hold and establish themselves in the area that you've moved them to. Right when you add them to the soil, you do want to make sure that they are well watered for that period of time. You know that saying where the best time to plant an apple tree is 15 years ago, but the second best time is right now. The same thing holds true for spring beauty. go ahead and get them started so that they can begin to become established and provide you with an amazing food and pollinators for amazing food in your yard.
Because in the context of our never go hungry series, spring beauty is a little bit different from all the other ones that we've covered like American lotus or acorns or hickory where you can really gather an abundant amount of them every single year. With spring beauty, like you see how much I have here, I wouldn't be able to gather that much from one spot every year. I see it more like charging up a battery or a reservoir. Once you get them established, they're slowly going to accumulate and build up that energy that you can pull from when you really need it. And outside of the early spring, they pretty much don't take up any space at all. So, there's no reason not to.
In terms of transplanting them though, I've noticed a huge difference in the vigor of the ones I've transplanted between the normal ones which look like this the first season versus the special monster spring beauties which look like this just after one year. Look at how much more dense they are. To get those vigorous dense clusters, you'll need to know how to find the big ones. But before that, let's take these inside and I want to show you how I actually cook with them.
Okay, so as I mentioned before, there's really two products that we get from Spring Beauty. We have the greens and the tubers. We'll talk about the greens first. From some of my previous experiences with this plant, I really thought that it was going to make like a decent salad green, and it kind of does, but when I tried to use it as like the whole base for a salad, it was just a little bit too much on the fiber side to really work for that in my opinion. I do think that the younger greens of Spring Beauty where they just come up when they're growing in more shaded conditions are a lot more tender. So, if you want the greens, those are the ones to go for. I also did try to blanch them. This is something that I do with many different wild greens. And again, it was decent. It wasn't bad, but not my favorite. My favorite blanched green in the spring would have to be Sochan by by a mile. Huge favorite. And my favorite good raw salad green. Still, in my opinion, nothing beats the crisp, juicy greens of American wild lettuce.
So, on to the tours. These ones, I promise, are not going to disappoint you, but you need to cook them right, or at least you need to prepare them correctly. So, first off, for cleaning them, I of course rinse any of the dirt off that is still on them. For the large clumps, naturally, you're going to get large bits that are sticking onto it. And if that's the case, then I'll place them into a big large bowl of water, and I'll let them soak for a little bit so that they come off a lot easier. Then, I strain all that water off until it's relatively clean and clear. Uh, and I'll run water over them to clean them a little bit further. At this stage, I also like to remove any of the above ground parts that are connected to the tuber. So, I'm dealing with just the tuber. To get them completely entirely clean, I do also like to use a vegetable brush, but if you did clean them very thoroughly in the last step, you might not have to use it too much or too thoroughly.
The tubers also have these little attachment points to the above ground parts, and those you do want to remove. You want to cut them off. Not because they're toxic or anything like we have with nightshade potatoes. They just don't have a good flavor. And I found that they were kind of tough. And the taste, by the way, is nearly identical to what you'd be familiar with of a potato. I'm confident that if I serve these to you and I didn't tell you what they were, you wouldn't think that they were anything else other than potatoes, which I don't know. I love potatoes and I think a lot of people do too. They're very good.
However, whether you clean the skin with a brush or not, you are really just removing the outer part, the outer coating of the skin, the actual skin on Spring Beauty is a little bit thicker. You can see me here. I'm removing the whole skin part with my nails. It's actually fairly easy to remove the whole skin either when they're raw or when they're fully cooked. If all you're going to do is boil them, I'd say don't bother removing it before because if you just kind of mush them down with a fork, it's pretty easy to pop out the inner part and then remove the rest of the skin and not eat it. There also was a bit of variability with the flavor of the skin. Some of them I found were completely fine, but other ones were a bit bitter. And that's why I think it's best to remove them if you want the, you know, optimal eating experience with Spring Beauty.
But with all that, I did one final test or one final experiment that I can't believe I haven't done before, to be honest. So, I par boiled them first with the skin removed at the beginning and then I took them and I sauteed them in oil after in really hot oil. This approach was without a doubt a 10 out of 10. And I don't say that for a lot of things. You get the really fluffy, starchy parts, plus a crunchy, rich, caramelized layer from where it was cooked in the oil. One of the best things I've ever eaten. Wow, the crunch is amazing. I'm so glad I tried that. I can't believe I haven't tried this sooner. That was delicious.
Now, you might be wondering in a lot of the footage that I'm showing you, I was cooking with a lot of the smaller ones. And the only reason for that is because all these big guys right here, I'm saving them to transplant. I want to get them more established, the big ones established in my yard. But of course, these large ones, they yield you way more and they're way easier to cook with because for each one that you peel, you're getting way more spring beauty compared to a smaller one. So now I'm going to take you guys backward side and I'm going to show you the tricks that I use to find the big ones successfully and consistently.
Some fields of spring beauty have a bunch of these and others have none at all. Again, I really think there is a genetic component at play with where they actually occur. And in modern American history, practically nobody has cared about spring beauty. So now you and I have the opportunity to take part in propagating them and cultivating a potentially brand new American crop in our yards, at least brand new in the modern era. So here's what you're going to have to do to find the really big ones. First, when you get out to the ground, I want you to get really low and look out across a large population of them. What you want to look for across the whole population, they'll all be kind of level and then there'll be a spot where they kind of protrude above all the other ones. That is a sign that if you dig under that, you're going to find one of the big ones. You can see it right here how clear it is, how densely that all of these are growing. And believe it or not, but all of those go to one single tuber. So, you have to imagine if one tuber is producing all of those aerial parts, it has to be pretty big to be supplying all of that energy.
The largest of these that I found so far was around 2 oz, which is larger than a lot of baby potatoes that you get from the grocery store, which to me is crazy considering that nobody had to go out and tend to them or water them or, you know, till them or anything like that. They just grow like that perennial all on their own. If you do happen to find one of these larger tuber populations, then please send me a message with a picture of it. I really want to see where people are spotting them because I'm also really curious how far across North America that they actually occur, how big of their range they grow like this. Maybe it's only in the south. I'm not sure. Uh in my foraging community server, we can have a little contest where you can submit photos with how much that one that you found weighs. Assuming, of course, that with the big one that you found, you're going to propagate and protect them. I think that would be a whole lot of fun. Uh, and yeah, it'd be really cool to see uh year after year, who can find the biggest spring beauty tuber. Uh, and you can even divide these into multiple parts to spread them to different areas. So, for the ones that you were seeing in my yard, those came from just 1/4 of a whole tuber. All you need to do is make sure that where you're cutting has, you know, an eye on it like you'd see on a potato where the sprouts are coming up.
Spring beauty is a plant where I think that forging for it and you all developing a relationship with it will lead to there being way more of it out there even though we're kind of digging up the tubers along the way. And there's another amazing American wild food that is facing an alarmingly steep decline with beautiful flowers that you can spot in the springtime during spring beauty season and they are the incredible American wild plums. I want to show you how you can find it and forge it and how to propagate them as well. And I cover everything about that in this video right here. Again, my name is Jesse. Thank you so much for watching and I hope to see you there. Okay.