Dandelion and violet flower honeys and vinegars

Dandelion and violet flower honeys (Photo by bodhilens)

Dandelion and violet flower vinegars (Photo by bodhilens)

Paying attention to wild plants gives me a sense of abundance, and learning about them makes me appreciate their uniqueness and beauty. Many of them are actually nutritious and/or medicinal. I do not see them as unwanted and invasive "weeds" anymore, but instead I am always amazed by their vitality. I am even grateful for their generosity when I keep harvesting them to make herbal infusions, vinegars, tinctures, and honeys, and they keep coming back. I have just made small jars of dandelion and violet flower honeys and vinegars, and look forward to using them in teas, salads, and sweets.

Directions:

1. Select a glass jar that is a right size for the amount of your harvest.

(Ideally, fill a jar with flowers and honey to the top. I filled mine over a few days because I could only harvest a soup-bowl-full of flowers a day from my yard. Also, use a plastic lid or a parchment paper liner under a metal lid for vinegars.)

2. Pick flowers and rinse them with water to clean any dirt and small insects off.

(I usually just pour tap water in the bowl of flowers, stir for a minute, and scoop the flowers out in a strainer to drain.)

3. Air-dry flowers on a clean cloth.

(If flowers are dirt-free and/or you want to keep pollen, skip #2 and let small insects escape at #3.)

4. Sterilize the jar.

(I usually place a jar and a lid in a bowl and pour boiling water over them, carefully take them out on a clean cloth, and air-dry them.)

5. Put flowers in the sterilized jar and pour honey (preferably organic raw honey) or apple cider vinegar in. Use a clean chopstick to stir and make sure all flowers are mixed well with honey or vinegar.

6. Keep herbal honeys and vinegars in a dark place. Check everyday for a week or so and top off honey or vinegar to keep flowers mixed well with honey or vinegar. Enjoy consuming herbal honeys in 2-4 weeks, herbal vinegars in 4-6 weeks.

Here are some nice videos of Susan Weed making violet flower honey and dandelion flower vinegar. She explains that the medicinal properties of honey are "soothing and dissolving," and violet flower adds to the effects. Therefore, violet flower honey helps to heal bruises, minor burns, and sore throat. She also explains that vinegar extracts vitamins and minerals out of plants, and dandelion flower vinegar is especially good for digestion.

Last year I made and consumed quite a bit of dandelion leaf and root vinegar. It is even more nutritious and medicinal than the flower vinegar, and all the minerals extracted from the plant makes apple cider vinegar tastes mellower, which makes it perfect for salad dressing. The flower vinegar is prettier, though.

Roasted dandelion roots (and roasted barley) for a coffee substitute

I've been learning a lot to enjoy eating dandelions this year. In late spring, I infused mature leaves and young roots in apple cider vinegar, and I've been using the mineral-rich, less acidic vinegar for a salad dressing (dandelion leaf and root vinegar tastes milder than apple cider vinegar itself due to a lot of calcium in the leaves and starch-like inulin in the roots extracted by vinegar). In early fall, I harvested re-emerged young leaves as salad greens, which was surprisingly tasty, like arugula. Now I'm harvesting a lot of thick tap roots to roast for a caffeine-free coffee substitute. Here are my steps:

1. Wash harvested dandelion roots well, air-dry and chop them up.
2. Roast the roots in the oven at between 200F and 250F (with the oven door slightly open) for a few hours until they turn dark brown with chocolaty aroma.
3. Grind the roasted roots in the blender.
4. Make decoction (boil and simmer for 15-20 minutes) with 3 teaspoonful of ground roasted roots in a mug-cupful of water.

Roasted dandelion root decoction tastes like weak but bitter coffee, so I usually add a smidgen of stevia and 1 teaspoonful of heavy cream to make it taste like cafe ole. To make it even more flavorful, I roast barley (preferably germinated for a few days) in a frying pan (about 20-30 minutes in low heat) and mix it with roasted dandelion roots (about 2:1 ratio). Roasted barley seems to add boldness and sweetness. I plan to grow chicory next year. Hope I will be able to harvest the chicory roots to add to the mix by this time next year.

Roasted dandelion roots mixed with roasted barley

Ground roasted dandelion roots and barley

Roasted dandelion roots and barley cafe ole with a curious cockatiel