This same time, years previous: ice cream supper, Shirley’s sugar cookies, the trouble with Mother’s Day, the basics, more on trash, the quotidian (5.21.12), savoring Saturday’s sun, through my daughter’s eyes, chocolate-kissed chili, and ranch dressing.  

Last week, my cousin-neighbor watched a couple of my kids while I did Something Or Other. When I picked them up, she said, “We planted a cover crop of lambsquarters. Would you like some?” And then she handed me a grocery store bag packed full of weeds.

I wasn’t completely thrilled, I must admit. Weeds sounded rather sub par. Inferior. Like trashy real greens. But I said Sure, and How do you cook them, and then I took the bag home and stuffed it in the crisper where I mostly forgot about it for several days.

But then Sunday noon rolled around. I was heating up leftover rice and chicken (a meal that I will be telling you about in very short order because it is THE BEST CHICKEN EVER), had pulled some na’an out of the freezer (a little shop in town sells real na’an, not that fake stuff Costco sells), and was fishing around for a vegetable that wasn’t green beans when I remembered the weeds.

What the heck, I thought, and grabbed a big handful of weeds and commenced a-plucking leaves from stalks. My hands got sandy-gritty from the leaf fuzz (though the plants didn’t seem that dirty), so I gave them a good washing and salad-spinner spinning before tossing them in a skillet along with some sizzling butter. The weeds cooked down lickety split. I sprinkled them with salt, gave them a hearty drizzle of lemon, and you know what? They were fabulous. Texture-wise, they’re like a cross between tender spinach and baby kale and something else…maybe celery leaves? Flavor-wise, they’re like any other mild-tasting, sweet green: utterly delicious.

We feasted on those weeds all week long. I cooked them up to eat alongside our beans and rice, and another time I threw a couple large handfuls of the chopped leaves into a pot of soupy beans, spinach, and salsa. I sautéed a bunch to use as a stuffing for a light sushi supper. And last night I cooked up the very last of the weeds and stuffed them into spicy pork-and-feta tortilla wraps.

Lambsquarters would be a splendid addition to countless dishes—think quiche and soup, for starters—anything that calls for cooked greens, really. Packed with protein, iron, calcium, and vitamin C, A, B1, and B2, they are super healthy, even more so, in some regards, than spinach and cabbage.

Moral of the story: If someone ever offers you a bag of weeds, snatch those babies up.

Sautéed Lambsquarters with Lemon

a large bowl of lambsquarters
1 tablespoon butter
salt
lemon wedges

Pluck the leaves from the thicker stems (just because they can be a little tough), but don’t bother to separate out the tender baby stems. Wash well and spin dry.

Sizzle a pat of butter in a skillet and then toss in a great mountain of the weeds. Push them around for 1-2 minutes until wilted and dark green. Sprinkle with coarse salt and lemon juice. Serve hot.

Add skillet-cooked (or steamed) greens to any number of soups and pots of beans.

Note: my cousin-neighbor said not to eat the lambsquarters raw. I can’t remember why, and since I didn’t taste them raw myself, I don’t know. Maybe because of the fuzzy texture? Or perhaps they have a bitter flavor? (Oh wait. Right here it says that the leaves have oxalic acid which can make your throat burn. So there you go.)

This same time, years previous: after one year: Costco reflections, finding my answers, the quotidian (5.20.13), up at the property, the boring blues, and fowl-ness.

Just a few weeks after my husband finished putting in the fence, my husband’s co-worker purchased a bunch of steers and then offered to sell a couple of them to us. The timing was perfect, so we jumped at the offer.

It’s about time we put those couple extra acres to good use. For awhile there, I wondered if it’d ever happen. When I credited my husband’s farming plunge to his friend’s push, my husband said, “No, it’s not because of him. It’s because we finally have fence. I told you we’d get animals when I got the fence up.”

So now we have two steers, numbers 20 and 26. The plan is to sell them once they get big. Or maybe we’ll have one butchered for ourselves (and our beef-eating friends)? We’ll see. In the meantime, the field gets mowed and the animals get fat. It all feels terribly productive, but in a deliciously lazy sort of way.

My daughter wants to train the steers to do tricks and go over jumps. I wouldn’t be surprised if she figures out a way to ride them, too. Less than twenty-four hours after they arrived and she’d already coaxed them into letting her give them hugs.

This same time, years previous: the quotidian (5.18.15), campfire cooking, the quotidian (5.19.14), my favorite things, rhubarb streusel muffins, and caramel cake.