The bitter-sweet taste of young garlic mustard (Alliaria petiolata) blends subtly with the herby tastes & textures of cow parsley, to make a fine substantial sauce suitable for pasta or grains. The kind of food I need to eat when I return home if I’ve been wandering on the road for a week or so.
Ingredients
- 50g garlic mustard tips (shredded & chopped )
- 400g vine-ripened cherry tomatoes (chopped)
- 1 red chilli (chopped)
- 50g cow parsley shoots & buds
- 1 banana (chopped)
- 1 tbs honey
- 2tbs tomato purée
- 30g parmesan cheese
- 3tbs oil/butter
Suggested Instructions
- Heat oil and add the chilli and garlic mustard tips, and cook on medium for 3 minutes.
- Add the cherry tomatoes, banana, tomato purée & honey. Mix ingredients and simmer on low for 30 minutes.
- Add chopped cow parsley, parmesan cheese, then put a lid on the saucepan, remove it from the heat and leave for 20 minutes.
- Cook some spagetti, and when done serve with the garlic mustard sauce.
Serves: 2
On a walk, 5 May 2022, I ate around 3 or 4 garlic mustard leaves on an empty stomach (before eating my picnic sandwiches) and was surprised soon afterward to get ‘liver pain’, this is a pain under my right ribs and spreading to under my right shoulder blade. I had it before after eating Quorn, so I knew what it was. I quickly ate my sandwiches and the pain eased. Also drank water as I continued on my walk. After the walk and the next 2 days, I felt unusually exhausted and ached all over. For 2 days I also had Diarrhea (a yellow colour, same colour after eating Quorn). I am feeling better this morning.
But it shows you cannot be complacent about what you find good to eat . . . where it grows must be of more significance than I would have thought.
Other years I have nibbled garlic mustard leaves and flowers I found along my walks, enjoying the peppery taste, without any problems afterwards. I don’t know if it was to do with where they were growing, but it would seem not all plants of the same type are good to eat.