Thursday 17 May 2012

Free Food!

There are so many aspects of simple living but today I'm going to show you how to find free food! G and I take a 5 mile  japa walk most mornings. This morning I noticed that the fiddle head or the tightly furled new growth of the "ostrich fern" were growing profusely all along the border of our bog. The fiddle heads are best picked when they are perhaps 5 inches tall. The head needs to be furled tightly ...if they begin to unfurl they just aren't edible. I always tell the plant that I'm going to pick it so that gives it time to turn off the nerve impulses to that part. Also only pick what you are going to use immediately and don't pick to much off of the same plant. Then silently thank the plant before you leave.
I once almost died over these things. I was 9 months pregnant with my daughter and I decided to go for a short walk down to our brook to see how the fiddle heads were doing. Well stupid me...really I don't think my brain was in my head at this point or else I would have clued into the fact that we had a bad rainfall during the night and something had blocked our culvert...so the stream had backed up and the road had become a dam...where once was a cute...trickly 3 foot wide brook ..now was a lake of 100 ft across and at least 30 feet deep. Anyways I checked the fiddle heads and then climbed back up the embankment .....just as I reached the top...I heard this thunderous crack and turned around to see the entire road disappear... the wall of water smashed the trees and my poor fiddle heads to bits with tons of boulders.
Anyways...no biggie..I lived!
Just wash the fiddle heads with loads of fresh water and I always soak everything in 1/2cup vinegar for 15 minutes. Drain the greens and blanch for 5 minutes...drain once again and fry them up with butter...hing...salt and pepper. Some people think that they taste like asparagus....I'd think more like mushrooms or something equally earthy.
I noticed that they sell for about 5 dollars a lb. at the store.
I offer all of my food to Srila Prabhupada but offer to your chosen one as a thank you....it's the polite thing to do.~ Hare Krsna, Kokum Lal

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