Confused about the differences between common nettle (stinging nettle) and purple dead nettle? Here’s how to confidently tell them apart! Basic Plant Information: Purple Dead Nettle Latin name: Lamium purpureum Growing details: winter annual that can grow up to 16 to 18″ tall, but is often about 12″ Purple dead nettle leaves often show up…
Looking for a homemade version of those canned diced green chiles that you buy in the store? Here’s how you make them! You can also use these same directions to can any type of pepper – whether they are hot or sweet. Near the end of late summer, we always have more peppers than we…
Being able to identify Jack O’ Lantern mushrooms is an essential skill for mushroom foragers! This is especially useful when hunting for chanterelles, or other orange mushrooms, such as chicken of the woods. In this article, I’m sharing photos and tips to help you better tell the difference between toxic Jack O’ Lanterns (Omphalotus illudens),…
Raspberry leaves are so easy to harvest, dry, and turn into tea! You can pick leaves any time they are green and fresh looking – I’ve been picking a few small handfuls this week, in anticipation of an upcoming hard frost. Picking the Leaves: Inspect your raspberry bushes before you start selecting to pick. You…
Ragweed and goldenrod get mixed up so often, but it’s not because they look alike! It’s because goldenrod has a showy yellow bloom right around the time ragweed pollen is making everyone sneeze. Goldenrod gets all of the blame, but it’s actually used by folks to help with seasonal allergies! In this article, you’ll learn…
One of my favorite easy and healthy summer side dishes is grilled corn salad, loaded with veggies fresh from my garden! Here’s my simple take on that classic recipe, but keep in mind that corn salad is super flexible, so feel free to switch out or add in veggies, or try a different dressing to…
Corn Smut, also called Huitlacoche, Corn Mushroom, Corn Fungus, or Mexican Truffles, is an edible fungus that can be found on developing ears of corn. Though it’s considered a pest for most corn farmers in America, it’s also an umami-rich delicacy when prepared correctly! If you’ve never tried corn smut (corn mushroom) before, let me…
This cooling jewelweed spray helps soothe the itch of poison ivy, poison oak, bug bites, and bee stings. If you enjoy foraging or exploring the outdoors during late summer, you’ve likely stumbled upon a patch of jewelweed before. Jewelweed (Impatiens capensis) especially loves to grow on creek banks, or in areas where the soil is…
Learn how to pressure can fresh pinto beans picked right from your garden, or found seasonally at your local farmer’s market! A common way of canning pinto beans involves soaking and rehydrating store-bought dried beans. As a gardener who grows your own beans, you can just pick FRESH pinto beans out of your garden, shell…
Learn how to can fresh black beans, using a pressure canner and shell-out beans from your garden! Black beans are very easy to grow at home. In fact, we grow ours using nothing more than a bag of store bought dried black beans as seeds, and a few tilled rows in the garden. While you…
Learn how to can fresh kidney beans when they’re in the shelling stage! Homegrown canned beans have an amazing taste and texture. It’s easy to grow your own kidney beans in a home garden. They’re not fussy, and provide loads of beans for the small price of seed. (Yes, you can even plant inexpensive store-bought…
Learn how to forage, identify, and harvest black walnuts (Juglans nigra) plus how to dry and cure the nuts, and use the hulls and leaves for remedies! ID Tips for Black Walnuts (Photo Identification) Black walnut is a native tree, for those of us who live in Eastern North America. It’s a tall beautiful tree,…