Weeds in the Salad

Continuing with our dandelion theme this afternoon, we gathered some information for a couple of fun science projects, to try out for Science Sunday (but you'll have to come back, later this weekend, for those), and we read Mia Posada's Dandelions: Stars in the Grass. It's both a tribute to the under-appreciated flower, and a science book for children, chocked full of interesting facts, and illustrations. It even has a recipe at the back!

Now, if your familiar with this blog at all, then you know we love books with recipes. Even at my most optimistic though, I didn't think anyone in my family would be willing to try Zigorriesalat (or dandelion green salad). So, I came up with a compromise.

I found a small patch of dandelions, that I knew had not been sprayed, and that had not yet blossomed flowers. You don't want to eat the greens, once the flowers have blossomed. To say they will bitter, would be an extreme understatement.

Anyway, I washed, and dried the greens, and put them into an unassuming bowl in the fridge. The greens I picked were close enough to plants, that did have flowers, for me to verify, and be certain they were dandelions, too - that's another thing you want to be sure of. Not everything that's green, and leafy is good for you.



Then, I called my husband, and asked him to pick up a bag of salad greens on the way home from work, because everything that comes from the store, in a bag, must be good to eat - right?


I was tempted to slip the dandelion greens in with the others, without telling anyone. But, I don't like to be tricked when I'm eating, so it didn't seem right for me to trick my family. Instead, I gave the children a sampling of each type of green, from the bag, and from the bowl.


None of them are huge salad fans, so they weren't too thrilled with the tasting, but they didn't see, or taste any difference between the regular salad greens, and the dandelions.


Even the man of the house, who wouldn't try my dandelion flower cookies last year, had to admit, that the greens weren't too bad. Not that he's going to stop spraying, and let me grow a salad crop of them, but he managed to chew and swallow, without gagging.

It's great to be a homeschooler.