An old spring movie

Somehow this video never made it online. Knotweed is a great plant not only because you can cook it sweet and savory, but also because it is so dominant in so many landscapes, you can beat the heck out of it and not worry about it. Last spring I drove my new bicycle and myself through this patch of it on Martha's Vineyard.

Follow this link for the video.



More currently, some friends and I did a quick tour of Santa Barbara wine country this past weekend. After two sips at our first stop, I got bored with that and decided to take advantage of the cacti growing beside the tasting house. I harvested them (carefully, using newspaper and cardboard so as to not get a handful of prickers Lorena-style) and we dined on them over the next couple days. As is often the case with my foraged goodies, I ate about 80% of what I hauled in, and everyone else respectfully had a bite or two. In this case, OK by me. Prickly pear cactus: grainy pulp like watermelon, magenta juice, mildly sweet, and seeds that go right down. Much better than the one I found in a New Hampshire supermarket one day. Random websites also reveal that prickly pear is "High in Dietary Fiber, Vitamin C, Magnesium, Calcium and Potassium." Every plant is high in some good vitamins though, so I usually don't care about this, but a friend of mine asked though, so there it is.