NETTLE:  An excellent food, medicine, and fibre source

 

 

Often during this time of the year, I get an allergic reaction when I’ve been under and around the trees that produces lots of pollen and cottony-fluff, like willows, and cottonwoods, and cattail, and oak.  I’ve tried numerous remedies over the  years to combat the allergy, but all with limited success. It just won’t work to stay out of the woods.

But finally, one of the natural remedies seemed to have good results. Nettle tea. I’ve long heard of the many health benefits of eating nettles and drinking the nettle tea.  I’ve eaten the greens like spinach for decades.  But once I heard about using an infusion of the nettle leaves (dried or fresh) for allergy, I’ve starting drinking it pretty regularly in the evenings.  It has helped to relieve congestion and improve my ability to breathe.  It seems  to work even better than my old standby, Mormon tea.

So I went out to collect a large bag of nettles.  I know of a field that gets mowed down every year, so I knew that the nettle was not valued there.  I went there with my cloth bag and my scissors.  I found it easiest to clip off the tender tops with a pair of sharp scissors, and just let the nettles drop into the bag without touching it. After a while though, I was simply cutting with scissors and putting the tops into my bag with my other hand. I got nettled a little but they don’t seem to bother me that much anymore.

It felt good to be alone in the field where it was quiet and green and misty. But I wasn’t totally alone. There were people walking by.  One woman just looked at me as she and her friend walked by, and it was a very telling look. “Wow, I really pity you!” was written all over her face.  Oh, well. I’ve heard worse.

I finally left with my very full bag of nettle greens.  Some of the tops went into our evening soup, and the rest I cleaned and set out to dry for future tea.  The soup was very enjoyable and tasty, and I realized that nettle is one of the tastiest wild greens out there, and widely under-rated.

 

ALL ABOUT NETTLES

Stinging nettle (Urtica dioeca) is a fairly common plant thoughout most of North America, as well most of the rest of the world.  Nettle is one of those plants that landscapers and Martha Stewart-trained gardeners love to hate.  It is one of the plants that you always see on the charts of “noxious weeds” published by companies such as Ortho and others, letting you know that their product will effectively wipe out these “worthless plants” in your gardens.

It’s understandable why so many people dislike nettle.

If you haven’t yet made nettle’s acquaintance, brush up against a few plants with bare arms or legs. Ouch!, you’ll yell. Those tiny little needles that cover the plant are not spines, like cactus spines. They are actually hollow needles filled with formic acid, and the formic acid gets onto your skin when you brush against the plant. Formic acid causes an immediate burning sensation, and, in severe cases, severe welts that will last for hours.  The burning of nettles is relieved by taking the common curly dock leaves, bruising them, and rubbing them on the nettled skin.  No curly dock?  I have taken the young leaves of wild grasses, crushed it so it was like a poultice, and applied it to nettled skin with good results.  If you have any Aloe vera leaves nearby, those are even better for dealing with the nettle burns.

It seems that the more you interact with nettles, the less it bothers you.  I once met a woman who demonstrated how she ate young nettle leaves raw, claiming that the formic acid no longer bothered her.  She would just take a small top of a plant, and put it into her mouth stem side first.   She said she had done this for years, and she went on to fill her bag with nettles with no gloves.

Though I don’t eat nettles raw, for the past several years I have been collecting young nettles with my bare hands, and it seems to bother me less and less.

BENEFITS OF NETTLE

On the Wild Food Outings that I conduct, we usually find patches of the nettle which are best collected in late winter and spring.  One participant, Carlos Hall, would always collect a large bag of the nettle tops whenever we encountered some.  Whenever Carlos was with us, he made sure there was a large bag of tender nettle leaves to cook. Then we’d make our fire and cook the tender greens in a large pot.  This was Carlos’ favorite dish, and it was because of Carlos’ insistence that I began to collect and eat nettles on a more regular basis.

Nettle greens, simply boiled and served with no seasonings at all, is delicious and has a flavor similar to buttered greens.

After I eat the greens, I usually drink the water in which we boiled the nettles, and it tastes like a hearty broth.  During our field trips, I would pour out this water into everyone’s cup.   It’s also an excellent basis for soups.

Nettle also makes a great cream soup.  You can heat milk, or begin with powdered milk.  You want to slowly warm the broth, not boil it.  Chop up the nettle tops and add to the broth.  On occasion, we have added potato flour to this to make it thicker. But you can experiment to make the type of soup you like.

You should also try nettles in egg dishes.  Heat the pan and fill it with nettle greens.  Now would be the time to add chopped onions too.  After a few minutes when the greens have started to wilt, add your eggs. You can turn this into a scrambled egg dish, or an omelette.   Again, nettles has flavor, so you don’t really have to add anything to it.  If anything, add some hot sauce.

Nutritionally, nettles is a good source of Vitamin C and A.  According to the USDA’s Composition of Foods, 100 grams of nettle contains 6,500 I.U. of Vitamin A, and 76 mg. of Vitamin C.  There was no data on the other commonly measured minerals and vitamins – perhaps more recent research is available.

Herbalist Michael Moore, author of Medicinal Plants of the Mountain West, describes nettles as a diuretic and astringent, and he advices the tea for use in cases of internal bleeding.

It is probably common knowledge that nettles provided food for Europeans during WWII when normal food supplies were not there.  Nettles grew everywhere and many good recipes were developed during that era.

Also, as most survival skills practitioners know, the stalk of nettle makes a good fibre for such things as cordage, netting, snares, sandals, and baskets.  You gather the mature stalks and let them rot in water for a few weeks. Then you gently pound them to get the fibre, which you then twine into cordage of your desired thickness and length.  Of course, if you cannot wait a few weeks, you simply take the stalks to the river and begin the gentle pounding to extract the fibre.

Nettles are found growing best near streams, in moist soil, in rich soil, and often near raspberries and blackberry vines.  I also find it growing sparsely in the poorest soil, so its distribution is pretty widespread.

If you cannot yet recognize the wild nettle plant, most gardeners or landscapers should be able to show you one. Or go to a nursery, where nettles are often growing in their pots and soil.