Nettlefest

I knew nettles were good for us, but really, how good? To find out, I was inspired to get a lab sample of one of Galiano’s most prominent forageable foods. I then compared the analysis against the nutrient values of kale, broccoli, lettuce, spinach and 2% milk (you’ll see why) and the results blew me away. The data on the foods below came from the USDA Nutrient Database and the Canadian Nutrient File.

Most surprising to me was that nettles have the highest calcium content of all these foods.

Food    Calcium Value per 100g

Nettles, Blanched    481mg

Kale, Raw    150mg

Milk, 2%, with Vitamins A & D 128mg

Spinach, Raw    99mg

Broccoli, Raw    47mg

Lettuce, Green Leaf, Raw    36mg

One would have to drink over three times as much milk to get the same quantity of calcium as one portion of nettles.

Nettles also exceed on the dietary fibre front:

Food    Fibre Value per 100g

Nettles, Blanched    6.9g

Kale, Raw    3.6g

Milk, 2%, with Vitamins A & D 0g

Spinach, Raw    2.2g

Broccoli, Raw    2.6g

Lettuce, Green Leaf, Raw    1.3g

Two other mineral comparisons I thought I’d mention are magnesium and potassium. As you see in the chart below, nettles have relatively high amounts of both minerals. Comparatively, spinach has the highest magnesium and potassium value; and kale also exceeds nettles in potassium value.

Food    Magnesium Value per 100g    Potassium Value per 100g

Nettles, Blanched    57mg    334mg

Kale, Raw    47mg    491mg

Milk, 2%, with Vitamins A & D 14mg    162mg

Spinach, Raw    79mg    558mg

Broccoli, Raw    21mg    316mg

Lettuce, Green Leaf, Raw    13mg    194mg

There were many other interesting comparisons, but the ones above were the main highlights. As we head into an early spring, with nettle growth well underway, I’m going to try to make the most of nettle harvesting, drying and storing. Move over milk and make way for those nettle smoothies!

This years Nettlefest will be happening on Sat April 5th at 5:30pm at the South Community Hall.

Nettle Picking starts at 11am. Meet at the Community Hall with baskets, clippers and GLOVES to Carpool to the picking spot.

Kitchen starts at 11:30am at the hall. Volunteers will be making Nettle Bread and soup together.

Nettle Vendors are welcome to set up a table in the hall during the day. Contact us if you’re interested.

Potluck Dinner starts at 5:30pm.

Come get involved in this annual Galiano celebration of Spring!!!

Are you interested in eating more local food and cooking with wild ingredients? Come spring, stinging nettles are among the first edible plants to burst from the ground in the Pacific Northwest. In an intimate setting just an hour’s ferry ride from the mainland, join us for a fun celebration of local wild abundance on beautiful Galiano Island April 12th and 13th, 2014, and learn all about nettles—their health and nutritional properties, how to harvest them, and how to cook and preserve them.

Introduction to Nettle Foraging – April 12th 10am-2pm

Wild Kitchen – Nettle Cooking with Alison – April 12th 4:00-8pm

Nettle Crafting Workshop with Cedana Bourne – April 13th – 10am-2:30pm

All events will take place at the South Galiano Community Hall, 141 Sturdies Bay Rd, Galiano Island.

To watch a great local nettle film – The Nettle Solution, check out:

Register at Eventbrite

$75 per workshop*.

Early bird special!! Register before April 1 and get 20% off.

Join us for the whole weekend and attend all three workshops for only $180*.

*Plus $10 supply fee for Nettle Crafting.

Registrants are responsible for their own accommodations. Discounts available at Driftwood Village.

This years Nettlefest Potluck will be happening on March 30th at 5:30pm at the South Community Hall. This year we have a special request – please wear green to the dinner!!

Nettle Picking starts at 10:30am. Meet at the Community Hall with baskets, clippers and GLOVES to Carpool to the picking spot.

Kitchen starts at noon at the hall. Volunteers will be making Nettle Bread and soup together.

Potluck Dinner starts at 5:30pm.

Come sing your nettle song or read your spring poem ! Come get involved in this annual Galiano celebration of Spring!!!

Nettle Vendors are welcome to set up a table in the hall for the evening. Contact us if you’re interested.

The 6th Annual Galiano Nettlefest Community Potluck  will take place on March 30th.

Stinging nettle (Urtica dioica) is a herbaceous flowering perennial, native to North America, Asia Europe, and northern Africa. The plant has long been used as a medicine and a vitamin-rich food source. It has a pleasant, grassy flavour, with a slightly metallic tang, similar to spinach. In spring, stinging nettle contains up to 25% protein, dry weight, which is high for a leafy green vegetable.

After soaking or heating to remove the sting, the leaves can be dried, puréed, or substituted for spinach in any recipe. Nettle soup is a common use of the plant in northern and eastern Europe.

The plant has hollow hairs on its leaves and stems which act like needles, injecting histamine and other chemicals that sting on contact. If you do get stung, a weed that often grows near stinging nettles, yellow dock (Rumex crispus), can be used as a home remedy. An ancient British charm goes: “Nettle out, dock in, dock remove the nettle sting.”

Nettles grow 3-7 feet tall in the summer and die back in winter. They spread by seeds and  runners. Nettles are considered invasive plants, but that also means they’re easy to find and easy to propagate. The plant grows quickly and attracts beneficial insects such as butterflies. It likes partial to full sun and is drought tolerant.

Nettles contain a lot of nitrogen, so they are used as a compost activator and to make liquid fertilizer. They are one of the few plants that can flourish in soils rich in poultry droppings.

Kathy Benger’s Nettle Beer Recipe

Into a pan holding one and half gallons, pack as many young fresh nettle tops as you can, with three young dandelion plants, leaves and roots alike, but with no flower-buds. Now wash nettles and dandelions thoroughly in salted water and scrub the dandelion roots free of fibres. Then rinse them all free of salt and put them back into the pan with the rind and juice of two lemons, half a pound of rhubarb sliced and bruised and three or four pieces of root-ginger about the size of hazel nuts. Then put in as much cold water as the pan will hold, set it on the stove and bring slowly to the boil. Simmer for half an hour.

Then put into a basin one pound of demerara sugar with an ounce of cream of tartar, and strain on to it the infusion in the pan, pressing the residue lightly to express all the moisture. When, in a few hours, the yeast has multiplied and there is a good ferment working, strain off the beer into strong screw-topped bottles and screw down firmly. The beer will be ready in five days.

The 5th Annual Nettlefest Community Potluck will be happening on March 17th.

One of the first real signs of spring on Galiano, and one of my favourite wild foods, are the new nettle shoots that start poking out of the ground early in the Spring. At a time when we’ve been living on frozen veggies, or cabbage and root vegetables, fresh greens are a welcome sight. Plus there’s the additional benefit that nettles are actually good for us. Nettles are extremely rich in vital nutrients, including vitamin D, which is rare in plants; vitamins C and A; and minerals, including iron, calcium, phosphorus, and magnesium. Nettle preparations also have been shown to be effective in controlling hay fever symptoms. They are good for arthritis and eczema.

Our local nettle – Urtica dioica – is a well-known type of nettle, but it’s not the only type. There are about 30 to 40 types in the Urticaceae family. There is a type in New Zealand that grows as tall as a tree and the sting has proved deadly to dogs and horses.

Nettle is best used for food when they are first coming up in the spring. Keep in mind that once the stems have started to elongate and they begin to flower, the leaves aren’t as tender. The color of the nettle leaves may vary from a light shade of green to dark green to a dark reddish-purple. Any of these leaf colorations is good for eating. However, it is said that the nettle leaves with more purple color indicates it’s richer in iron mineral.

Nettles are delicious – but most first time nettle eaters are nervous about being stung. However, once the nettles are steamed, frozen, dried or cooked the sting is neutralized. There are lots of different ways to use nettles: Make a fresh batch of healing nettle tea with either fresh or dried nettles, Use fresh nettle in scrambled eggs, pasta dishes, casseroles, and soups. You can cook nettles and eat them as you would steamed spinach — their taste and appearance are similar. Make powdered nettle by grinding dried nettle leaves in a coffee grinder. You can also juice nettles and combine the juice with other fresh juices, such as carrot or apple juice.

Here’s a great, simple recipe to use with spring nettles. Use this pesto on pasta, bread or anywhere you would use a basil pesto.

Alison’s Nettle Pesto

Steam (very slightly) 3 cups nettle leaves. (No stems)

Process in the food processor, in the following order:

6 garlic cloves

1/2 cup walnuts

Steamed nettle

Dash each of salt and pepper

Dash lemon juice

While the blade is turning, slowly add up to 1 cup olive oil.

Then add 1 cup parmesan.

This years Nettlefest will be happening on March 17th at 5:30pm at the South Community Hall.

Nettle Picking starts at 11am. Meet at the Community Hall with baskets, clippers and GLOVES to Carpool to the picking spot.

Kitchen starts at 11:30am at the hall. Volunteers will be making Nettle Bread and soup together.

Nettle Vendors are welcome to set up a table in the hall during the day. Contact us if you’re interested.

Potluck Dinner starts at 5:30pm.

This year we will be having two competitions:

The first: The Best Nettle Dish: Bring your favourite nettle dish. No restrictions on type. A panel of judges will choose their favourite.

The second competition: The Best Nettle Product: Serious or funny – your choice! All entrants will get a chance to “pitch” their product. Winners determined by the audience applause!

Come sing your nettle song or read your spring poem !

Come get involved in this annual Galiano celebration of Spring!!!