Welcome to the summary page for FabulousFusionFood's Cook's Guide entry for Burdock along with all the Burdock containing recipes presented on this site, with 16 recipes in total.

This is a continuation of an entire series of pages that will, I hope, allow my visitors to better navigate this site. As well as displaying recipes by name, country and region of origin I am now planning a whole series of pages where recipes can be located by meal type and main ingredient. This page gives a listing of all the Burdock recipes added to this site.

These recipes, all contain Burdock as a major wild food ingredient.

Buckwheat represents the seeds of the common buckwheat (Fagopyrum esculentum) a plant in the Polygonaceae (knotweed) family. It is often counted as a cereal, though unlike most cereals the buckwheats are not true grasses.

The name "buckwheat" or "beech wheat" comes from its triangular seeds, which resemble the much larger seeds of the beech nut from the beech tree, and the fact that it is used like wheat.

Common buckwheat was domesticated and first cultivated in southeast Asia, possibly around 6000 BC, and from there spread to Europe and to Central Asia and Tibet and it is now an economically important crop in Eastern Europe.

Buckwheat pancakes, sometimes raised with yeast, are eaten in several countries. They are known as buckwheat blinis in Russia, galettes in France (where they are especially associated with Brittany), ployes in Acadia and boûketes (that is, named the same as the plant they are made of) in Wallonia. In Italy buckwheat is sometimes used to make gnocci and buckwheat pasta is the basis of the famous pizzocheri, a northern Italian dish traditionally made with potatoes, cabbage and cheese.




Burdock

constituents like "%burdock%"

Arctinum minus

burdock.png

Burdock plant, including plant in flower and a close-up of burrs

Burdock plant, including plant in flower and a close-up of burrs

Wild Food Guide (Burdock)

Clay Baked Fish

Burdock Pickles



The name 'Burdock' actually refers to any of a group of biennial thistles in the genus Arctium, family Asteraceae though the term is most commonly used to refer to common Burdock (A minus) which grows wild throughout most of North America, Europe and Asia. Plants of the genus Arctium are most noticeable from their leaves which are dark green and can grow up to 45cm in length and which have a woolly underneath and their prickly seed heads noted for easily catching in the pelts of animals and the clothes of humans.

As a plant the taproot of young burdock plants plants (which are black) can be harvested and eaten as a root vegetable. While generally out of favour in modern European cuisine, it remains popular in Asia, particularly in Japan where A lappa is called gobo. The leaves are excellent for wrapping fish and meat prior to cooking on hot stones or in clay. The stems, when picked in May (do not pick any later) can be stripped of the hard outer stem which laves a thin pencil-like vegetable that can either be chopped for inclusion in salads or can be boiled and served with butter (in a similar manner to asparagus). Mixed with dandelion Burdock used to be used to make an alcoholic beverage (a non-alcoholic version, Dandelion and Burdock is still popular in Britain today.