Nettle Soup

Complaining about the weather is truly childish.  We can't DO anything about it. It doesn't help to complain.  And yet, people have been complaining about the weather since, well...probably since there were people!  We complain when it is too hot, too wet, too humid, or too cold.  We complain when it rains, when it snows, and then we complain when it doesn't rain or snow.  So, it's very uninspired to complain about the weather. And yet, I am filled to bursting with the desire to simply rant on and on--pages of ranting--about our weather.  So, if you can indulge this little outburst...

I AM SICK TO DEATH OF RAIN!!!  It is April.  Surely it is not too much to ask for a little sunshine.  A little warmth. No more temperatures down to the 30s at night!!!  Come on already!!!  I am tired of the wet, dank, gray, moldy, cloudy weather we've had for the past twelve months.  (well, maybe not the last twelve months entirely...)  We didn't even have a summer last year for cry'in out loud!  When will this rainy, gray season end?????

OK, I feel slightly better having gotten that off my chest.  Now onto what I was really going to write about:  nettles.

Entering into the territory of exotic cuisine, I cooked with nettles last night.  I made a nettle-potato soup, and my family actually ate it!  Well, Grace didn't try it, but her idea of a balanced meal is assorted types of white food, so a nettle soup would be way out of her comfort zone.  And actually, Brian was at work, but three out of five isn't bad, right?

This dinner idea came out of Saturday's edition of the Bainbridge Islander:
http://www.kitsapsun.com/news/2011/mar/26/stinging-weed-and-scrumptious-dinner/
Their front page was a story about people gathering nettles for soups and stir-frys.  I've read about people eating nettles before and it has always intrigued me.  First of all, I'm a gatherer at heart.  And second, I haven't been able to harvest anything for so long now that the tender new shoots of the numerous nettles in our woods are actually looking quite tempting.

A patch of nettles in our woods.  Who knew that these stinging weeds were actually tasty?

The article I read also talked about the high nutrition of nettles.  They are apparently a powerhouse of vitamins and minerals--full of all the nutrients we might be lacking after a long winter.  So it seems that nature has provided us a plant filled with everything we need, ready right when we need it.  And it's growing happily in our woods without any cultivating on my part. Of course the irony isn't lost on me as I pull out the nutritious happily growing "weeds" while trying to coax things like basil out of my garden.

Harvesting nettles isn't exactly easy--they really do have a powerful sting which can burn for days.  But, my need to harvest something and my crankiness about the weather motivated me to put on some stout gloves and try to collect nettles without getting stung.  Adventure farming you could say.

I used a recipe I got on-line (you really can find anything on the internet...) and aside from collecting the nettles, it was easy.  I sauteed potatoes, carrots, onions and garlic in some olive oil.  Then in a separate pot I boiled a gallon of chicken broth (I'm sure you could use any liquid) and using tongs, I added my fresh picked, tender nettle leaves.  I let them boil for a while and then added in the potato mixture and some salt and other seasonings.

After it had simmered for about an hour, I put my soup mixture through the blender to make a sort of cream of potato/nettle soup.  It would have been fine unblended, but I wanted the presentation to be as benign looking as possible.  After all, we have all been stung by nettles, so I wouldn't blame anyone for being a bit wary of nettle soup!  And, surprisingly, it was good!  People even had second helpings (okay, Sophie and I).  And I had fun cooking food from the "garden" -- something I haven't been able to do in months.