Dandelion foraging

Visions of the Rewilding Renaissance Grief & Praise
#1

i was gathering dandelions today in golden gate park for some tasty dandelion beer (using a recipe from Sacred and Healing Herbal beers, by Stephen Harrod Buhner, an amazing book :o) and talked my 12 year old little brother into coming along. while gathering dandelions in a little meadow, he advised me to leave some for the bumble bees we saw collecting pollen. i showed him how we could increase next years dandelions by blowing the seeds off the little round tufts. it was nice to see him so into it, especially since most of his time is spent in front of his computer watching movies or playing games.

a couple days before that he pointed out little circular patters in the fallen pine needles outside of our house and we were trying to figure out what had made them. the next day he matter of factly told me that they were created by robins and that he had watched them digging for bugs. this coming from a kid who has seen every southpark episode ever created and references family guy in almost all his conversations.

just thought i’d share that. :slight_smile:

#2

That Is a great book, and that’s one of the first beers I made out of it (the susun weed recipe in there with some minor changes). It was very tasty, although I wish I had used more dandelion root, as it was a little too “pale” for my taste. It also should have gone longer after I primed the bottles.

I was kind of like that as a kid. Deeply immersed in the culture, but still loved to go into the woods and make poultices and stuff. Over time, my connection to this culture waned, and I watched less Thundercats and Tracy Ulman (at the risk of dating myself) and going outside more. I’ll probably never be completely free of that crap till its gone, and I have more pressing matters.

Don’t forget to give your brother a sip of the beer he helped make :slight_smile:

If you’ve made any other beers out of there, let me know how they come out. :slight_smile:

#3

yeah, i love that book.
i started with a different recipe that required only the dandelion flowers so i used those instead of leaves and roots. as far as taste goes, it sure smells strong. i put a good amount of ginger in there too so i think that’ll give it a nice kick. i also used bread yeast instead of brewing yeast which will probably effect the taste a bit.

i see the wild person inside of my bro in funny little ways. i’ll definitely give him a sip, if not a bottle.