The time has come to further explore the joy of allowing a plant to grow where it is not traditionally wanted (ahem…weeds) and harvesting it for eating. Today I was out admiring the vegetable garden and noticed the extraordinary amount of growth such plants have achieved in the past few days. It has been “growing weather” lately with the right mix of showers and warm sun. I haven’t even needed to water the patch for a while so roots have been reaching down and growth pushing upwards almost audibly. It’s time to get eating and thinking of clever ways to introduce these lovelies to our plates. I harvested several Fat Hen and Good King Henry plants in their entirety as they were starting to overshadow some of the cultivated veggies like the tomatoes and carrots. These are easily identified in your wild flower books or online. The “Chenopodiums” are in the Goosefoot family, aptly named due to the shape of the leaves which resemble goose feet. Before spinach was introduced to the UK, Fat Hen was commonly used as a green to go with meats. It’s also closely related to Quinoa. I have known about it but have never cooked with it. Likewise with Good King Henry. I decided to use them as I would use Spinach in one of our favourite Indian recipes. It could have gone one of two ways but I had a good feeling about it. When I need inspiration or don’t know what to do, I reach for my copy of Laxmi Khurana’s book “An Indian Housewife’s Recipe Book”. If I haven’t shared my love for this book with you before, now is the time. It is the best and most used cookbook in our kitchen by me. My partner is just a naturally gifted cook and can put the most splendidly delicious food together as everyone who knows him can attest. I’m a recipe kind of gal. I often make the fresh Spinach curry on page 161 as it is beautifully simple, delicious and the spices are divine. The children were outside playing where I could hear them so I set to work. I washed the whole plants and plucked off the leaves because the stems felt a little tough. If you make this yourself, I’ll say about 3 cloves of fresh garlic works better in my opinion. I don’t ever seem to have garlic powder in. When I’d made some rice and the gently simmering pan of dark green curry was ready, I rushed a bowl up to my partner who is currently working from home. He gets experimented on regularly and is cautious because of some past mushroom incidents where once I was certain about some horse mushrooms that turned out to be yellow stainers! They didn’t make it into the pot so it was a lucky escape. The fresh Fat Hen and Good King Henry curry was a huge success I’m pleased to say. I even got an applause. I wish I could come up with a better name for it because it was BETTER than the Spinach version. “Fat King Henry curry” sounds funny and unappetizing. Chenopodium curry maybe. Suggestions are welcomed. It was glorious and healthy with so many vital vitamins, iron, fibre, calcium, protein and more. Humble little plants that grow so near and yet are so easily tossed on the compost heap. The growing weather is supposed to continue for a few days before another very warm spell. For tonight, I will dream of the next magical dish of wild greens I can share with you here. Wild, happy and free.