During the course of this spring and summer, Suburban Foragers have done much to explore the culinary possibilities of milkweed. We began in May by gathering the young shoots, which we cooked in several interesting ways, including boiling, barbecuing and shredding to create a substitute for seaweed salad. Next, we found a number of different ways to prepare the leaves and the flower buds, which included a colorful and tasty mixed salad.

We have now entered into yet another phase of this versatile plant.  During the next couple of weeks, it will be possible to harvest the young seed pods before they get too tough to eat.

During the weekend, I went out and harvested a small bag of pods, to use in our Sunday workshop. Apart from eating some of them raw, we used two different methods of preparing them for the table.

We made up a tempura batter then deep-fried them quickly, so as not to overcook them. The second method was to sauté them with some onions, garlic and diced red pepper, to which we added lambs quarters that Adrianne harvested from Cropsey Farm.

The tempura was crispy and delicious. The lambsquarters dish was made all the more appetizing by the addition of the sliced milkweed pods.

Yesterday, I once again got together with my favorite culinary maven, Lisa Caccamise of Simple Earth Cuisine. We foraged for some milkweed pods and some young garlic mustard greens which we added to the chanterelles that I had gathered and dried at the beginning of last week. I had never experienced cooking with dried mushrooms before, and this was a perfect opportunity.

We started out our day in the kitchen by soaking the mushrooms in hot water. After an hour we checked them to find that they were still somewhat chewy, so we put them on the stove in the hopes that boiling them would make them tender.

While we waited for the mushrooms to soften, Lisa experimented with slicing and frying one of the pods in garlic infused olive oil. We were very pleased with the results and decided this was the way that we would prepare the rest of them.

While the pods were sautéing, Lisa made an accompanying sauce with some homegrown Sun Gold cherry tomatoes, onions, garlic, some white wine to which she added the rich orange stock from the boiled chanterelles.

Once the mushrooms had softened, we sautéed them a long with some homemade pesto, which imbued them with a delightful basil flavor.

The reduction made from the tomatoes and wine proved to be the perfect accompaniment to the caramelized pods.

We served the sautéed mushrooms over a bed of sautéed mustard greens, which added a delightful bitterness in contrast to the flavor of the chanterelles.

If you have been following these e-mails over the course of the year, you will realize that not only have we explored the scope of milkweed, but we have also made a number of dishes using garlic mustard at its various stages. As this is a plant that tends to grow in abundance and take over large areas, we are always pleased to find ways in which to use it for its culinary purposes.  This is the ideal time to go and seek out the dead stalks and harvest the seeds which can be ground down and use like regular mustard, toasted like sesame seeds and sprinkled over food or stirred into almost any prepared dish.

Learn about Lisa at www.simpleearthcuisine.com