Fiddleheads & Folklore

Scrap Kitchen 06

Our final restart of 2021 is here. The Astrological New Year. Can you feel that kick in energy as we enter Aries season?

This time of the year, Ostara/Eostre the pagan cousin of Easter is all about rebirth, new life and budding plans. When thinking about the Wheel of the Year and what each season represents, it becomes clear where Christianity has copy-and-pasted, incorporate the traditions of the lands it was trying to convert. Hot Cross Buns (my true and enduring love) are one such tradition absorbed into Christianity, originally marked with the sun wheel symbolising the new year these spiced, fruity hunks of joy were a traditional Ostara fare. Here is a relatively quick Hot Cross Bun Recipe, to make the “cross” or whatever symbol your heart desires, simply mix flour and water into a thick paste and paint it on before the glaze. Other traditions to observe around this time are to paint eggs, bake bread, plant seeds and witness both the sunrise and sunset. One week across the pond and I have seen a lot of sunrises. Not by choice I might add. Timezones are a bitch but the mountains sure are pretty.

Tarot-wise the card for this week is one of my favourites; the Eight of Pentacles. The pursuit of proficiency through practice. The recollection of all that you have done before to get you to where you are, the devotion to this growing skill. I can’t think of a card that better summarises my journey this past year. Committing and recommitting to learning and growing. Always growing. Within this week, reflect on how far you have come, think of what you have practised over the past 12 months. How has it helped prepare you for now? What will you carry with you because of it? Where will you choose to focus next? What skills do you wish to hone?

Fiddlehead ferns are coming into season just about now. These new green shoots are an amazing alternative to asparagus, chuck them in omelettes, salads and quiches or fury them up with a little bit of garlic. The fiddleheads of ferns are the new shoot just before it unfurls into a whole new fern leaf, meaning there are various varieties of them (those of the Ostrich Fern are a fan favourite), but be careful not to pick any poisonous varieties. When foraging not only is it important to take no more than you need but selecting your foraged finds should be done with care. A rule of thumb is to make sure you have two methods of identification (e.g. leaves and flowers) that allow you to distinguish the plant, and if you are unsure leave it be. As Terry Pratchet (and also a polish proverb) once said something along the lines of “All mushrooms are edible. Some are only edible once.” The same applies to random plants you feel like trying.

With seasonal eats, we are coming to the time commonly known as the Hunger Gap. When traditionally your food stores would begin to run low and your spring crops had not yet grown. This would have been a time where preserves and dried goods were essential. The purpose of Scrap Kitchen, in some ways its’ namesake, is the use of scraps to feed yourself. Not that we should have to make do with less, but enabling people to stretch their food further, or even regrow it, and make less waste doing so, is at the core of this newsletter. As the Pandemic/Brexit/Austerity add further stresses to the food supply, staple goods are what I’m focusing on this week.

Yesterday I had a bit of a debacle figuring out how to make Polenta from popping corn. This should be super cheap, although ideally bought without plastic, a bag of these kernels go for less than £1. Grind them up, add a little salt and water, bring them to the boil and you have homemade polenta. Be sure to grind way longer than you think you need to and to cook thoroughly. Alternatively, you can try this stunning looking recipe for making Polenta and Mushrooms from pre-popped corn. If I had found this recipe earlier I would not have had such a crunch breakfast. As for other staples, flour can be used to make a whole range of filling foods from Biang Biang Noodles, to Roti, to Seitan (the meat alternative). Chickpea flour is an amazing way to make Tofu or Vegan Cheese at home, or it can be used with leftover veg scraps to make a Besan Chilla (a vegan omelette). Also finding out you could make crisps from lasagne sheets recently blew my mind.

For fresh produce then there is lots of scope for root veg soups and citrus, while purple sprouting broccoli is soon coming in. Certain bananas are also coming into ripeness, which may sound odd since they are available all year round. The real issue with these yellow bastards is eating them in time, when they tend to get overripe there are several options from making vegan nicecream, to protein-filled pancakes (I add oats and coco-powder to mine), to reliving Lockdown 1 by baking banana bread. You can also proactively preserve their flavour for longer by making dried banana crisps.

For planting projects I would ways suggest seeing if you can grow corn from your popcorn kernels, it’s amazing to see it shoot up over time. If you have enough space to plant corn then always plant it with its other sisters; beans and squash. You can learn more about this fascinating indigenous technique for maximising space, water storage, nutrients and growth in this brilliant podcast from Robin Wall Kimmerer for Emergence Magazine.

As I sign off I would like to direct your attention to these resources, which should help illuminate the ongoing racial violence Asian people are experiencing, exacerbated by Covid19. In the wake of the recent white supremacist terrorist attack in Atlanta that claimed 8 lives, discussions around de-humanisation, fetishisation and racism need to be had. My former employers Eat Chay, had some vital thoughts on the subject. This week I will be asking myself how I could have been a better ally to my Asian friends and colleagues.

As always I would love it if you could leave a comment, like or even share this post if you have learnt something. Or if you have any reflections on the information shared.

Stay Scrappy,

Magda

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Image Credit: Marta Dzedyshko, Jasmine Waheed and Markus Winkler.

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