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Chicory – Prebiotic, Coffee Substitute, Health Tonic – Weekly Weeder #5

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Welcome to the Weekly Weeder series. Today's featured plant is chicory, Chicorium intybus. The wild and domesticated varieties of chicory have a long history of use for food and medicine, and as a forage crop for livestock.

blue chicory flowers in bloom by a gravel driveway

Chicory is prized for its long taproot, which is roasted and used as a coffee substitute or coffee additive. The roots are also high in inulin, which is used as a sweetener and prebiotic. The plant contains compounds such as flavonoids and coumarins that may help fight disease. [Read more…]

Common Ragweed – Tips to Beat Ragweed Season – Weekly Weeder #7

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Today's featured Weekly Weeder plant is common ragweed, Ambrosia artemisiifolia. In this post, we’ll explain what ragweed is, identify prime ragweed season, share some ragweed pictures, and talk about ragweed allergies and control.

ragweed plant

Common ragweed is also known as ragweed, hayfever weed, bitterweed, bloodweed, crownweed, mayweed and bane of allergy sufferers everywhere. Some other common ragweed species include bur ragweed, giant ragweed and western ragweed.
[Read more…]

Dandelion Wine Recipe – And the Mistake You Don’t Want to Make

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Bottle of homemade dandelion wine sitting next to a bowl of dandelion flowers
Wine out of dandelions? You bet! Making homemade dandelion wine is a longstanding family tradition. We don't make it every year, but I do like to keep a few bottles on hand for company. You can use the dandelions from your yard, provided they are free of pesticides, herbicides and other things you don't want to eat. The taste of this dandelion wine is rich, golden and warming – more like a good brandy than a wine. I've had friends who don't normally like wine comment that they do enjoy this “spring tonic”.  [Read more…]

Elderberry Jelly Recipes – Low Sugar and Sure-Jell Options

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elderberry jelly on toastWhen we had a banner elderberry harvest, my friend, Tami, and I experimented with a variety of elderberry recipes, including two different types of elderberry jelly. One recipe is low sugar elderberry jelly made with Pomona's Pectin, and the other is a traditional elderberry jelly made with Sure-Jell pectin. [Read more…]

Butter and Eggs – Sweet Scented Bumblebee Magnet – Weekly Weeder #8

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Butter and Eggs, Linaria vulgaris, also known as wild snapdragon. Range and identification. Uses for wildlife, medicine and as a dyeing plant.
Welcome to the Weekly Weeder series, where we help you identify wild plants and how to use them. Today's featured plant is Butter and eggs,  Linaria vulgaris.
Butter and eggs is also know as yellow toadflax, wild snapdragon, flaxweed, bread and butter, false flax, brideweed, bridewort, Jacob's-ladder, rabbit flower, imprudent lawyer, pennywort and a host of other names.

The name “snapdragon” originates from the “popping” or “snapping” sound that is made when you squeeze the flower. According to Wildflowers of Wisconsin, the other common name, toadflax, is based on how the flower opens wide like a frog or toad's mouth when squeezed. (I wonder if the name “imprudent lawyer” is linked to that wide open mouth, too?)

A European import, it has now naturalized over most of North America, including inside my greenhouse. Though less commonly used than many other herbs, it does have anti-inflammatory and diuretic properties. [Read more…]

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