Edible Plants along the PCT
Taken from ”Edible Wild Plants: A North American Field Guide” by Sterling Publishing. You can click on any of the pictures for a close-up.
Cattail:
-end of roots can be eaten raw
-Sift pollen through fine screen, use as flour
Pigweed
-Boil fresh for 10-20 min. serve with seasoning
-Use fresh young leaves in salad
Lambs Quarter:
-Young leaves in salad or boiled 5 min.
Poverty Weed:
-boil leaves
Stinging Nettle:
-boil leaves
-wear gloves while picking
Plantain:
-Pick young leaves for salad or
-boil in salt water 5 min.
Cleavers, Goosegrass, Bedstraw:
-Pick young leaves for salad
(the first photo is of Cleavers, the second one is Bedstraw)
Miner’s Lettuce:
-All is edible
-Leaves and blossoms can be eaten raw
Fireweed:
-Use young leaves and flower-bud clusters in salad
-Boil small leaves with butter 2-3 min.
Chicory:
-Pick early leaves
-use bleached undergroung portion for salads
Reed Grass:
-Eat early shoots raw
-use roots same as Cattail
Bunchberry:
-Eat early berries raw
Peppermint and spearmint:
-Eat fresh leaves in salad
-crush in iced tea
(the first picture is peppermint, the second is spearmint)
Mountain Sorrel:
-eat fresh leaves raw
Purslane, Pursley:
-Use raw shoots in salad
-cook young plants 10 min.
Beaked Hazelnut:
-Pick fruit, remove husk, shell and eat
