And Then We Gorged Ourselves on Goosefoot

Goosefoot, aka lamb’s quarters, wild spinach, and pigweed, is said to be one of the most popular among wild edible plants, particularly when it comes to the uninitiate. 

As “Wildman” Steve Brill and Evelyn Dean put it: “If you begin learning wild foods with only a few plants…this widely distributed, easy-to-identify, tasty, nutritious, long-in-season plant should be one of the first on your list.”   

I don’t always tend to do things in the right order, so as it turns out, goosefoot ended up being more like #50 on my list. But boy, what a #50 it was! 

The opportunity to try it for the first time came about last week when Gregg and I visited his brother-in-law in Fort Collins, Colorado for an early birthday celebration. Steve was out back mowing the lawn for a much-hoped-for badminton tournament when we arrived. I quickly surveyed the small, fenced-in enclosure to find, much to my pleasant surprise, hundreds of lamb’s quarter plants in various stages of growth. “I thought they were pretty so I didn’t weed them out,” commented Steve, who is charged with the lawn care. Now that’s a good man! 

While Gregg and Steve battled it out on the slippery badminton field in the light rain, I foraged for goosefoot in the flower beds along the edges of his lawn, snipping the tops and individual leaves off tall plants and taking the small plants (8 inches in height or less) in their entirety. When the rain started coming down harder we went inside and I spent the better part of an hour meticulously washing and trimming leaves and stems.

“Those are going to be the cleanest lamb’s quarters ever eaten,” Steve commented from the living room, where he and Gregg had moved on to Wii badminton. So I go a little overboard sometimes. What can I say?

“It tastes like its relative, spinach …only better,” Brill writes in Identifying and Harvesting Edible and Medicinal Plants. “However, it shrinks by about two thirds when you cook it, so be sure to collect enough.”

Later that evening, when the pork was just about done and the potatoes were coming off the grill, I followed Mr. Brill’s suggestion and faithfully stuffed what I thought to be a gargantuan quantity of lamb’s quarters into a pan. I dashed it with olive oil, salted the leaves lightly, and cooked for a couple of minutes until the leaves wilted before adding a cup of water, covering, steaming for 7 minutes, draining, and sprinkling with soy sauce. What started out as about 8 cups of plant parts cooked down to about 2 cups. You do the math.

The goosefoot turned out to be a big hit with the boys. “Do you mind?” Steve asked me at dinner, looking a little sheepish, as he went for a second serving before he had even finished the first. “I think I like it better than spinach–and I love spinach.”

“I think this might be the best wild edible plant we’ve had yet,” Gregg announced at the end of dinner, pushing his cleaned plate away and patting his belly with satisfaction. 

Antiquated Nutritient Comparison 

In Common Edible and Medicinal Plants of Colorado, the Marchs cite U.S. Agricultural Handbook #8 (the closest reference I could find to this after a brief search was Handbook #8-1, published in 1979) in their comparison of the nutrients in “goosefoot” with selected commercial vegetables: 

• Protein in goosefoot: 19.1 grams protein/lb
• Protein in spinach: 13.4 grams protein/lb
• Vitamin A in goosefoot: 52,620 international units (?)/lb
• Vitamin A in spinach: 33,800 international units/lb

Obviously this data should be taken with a grain of salt for several reasons. First, the numbers are from a study that seems to have been published in 1979. Second, ”goosefoot” is a common name and could refer to any number of edible Chenopodium species. Third, a USDA study showed that the nutritional quality of 43 commercial vegetables has declined significantly since 1950 (see In Defense of Food, Amazon link at right, by Michael Pollan), meaning that the nutritional quality of goosefoot might now be even greater than the veggies listed. But I include the stats to show only that goosefoot might be very good for you, indeed. 

Edible Species of Goosefoot and a Wee Bit of Confusion over Common Names 

Of the edible species of Chenopodium, Samuel Thayer states in The Forager’s Harvest: A Guide to Identifying, Harvesting, and Preparing Edible Wild Plants that C. album is the most abundant, and also the one to which the monikers “lamb’s quarter” and “goosefoot” are applied. Later, however, he makes a distinction between the two common names when he explains that the also-edible eastern variety, C.  hybridium or C. simplex, aka “maple-leaved goosefoot,” has larger, darker leaves than lamb’s quarters. This confused me, as I have always seen the same common names used interchangeably–which is why, in the end, scientific names are superior to common names. For the purpose of this entry, however, I will refer to all of the similar, edible Chenopodiums by any and all of the above common names.  

Aside from C. album and C. hybridium, Thayer lists some of the other edible varieties of Chenopodium: C. capitatum (Rockies and parts north) C. fremontii (west), and C. berlandieri, among others. (For more information, pick up a copy of The Forager’s Harvest. ) 

In Best-Tasting Wild Plants of Colorado and the Rockies, Cattail Bob Seebeck describes the leaves of three edible species of Chenopodium as “goose-foot shaped” (go figure) with “lighter coloration on new growth at the tip,” and often with red stripes on the stem. Some varieties have a whitish powder on the underside of the leaf. (Aside from that, please refer to the pictures and your plant guides for positive identification). Bob advises staying away from “rank smelling or bad-tasting Chenopodium members,” as not every plant in the genus is edible. Personally, I don’t like eating smelly or gross things, so it seems like a good rule of thumb to me. 

The wild edible plants experts have a few cautionary notes when it comes to grazing on goosefoot. Even with edible varieties, Cattail Bob warns that “like spinach, eating large quantities of lambs quarter may produce mild oxalate/nitrate poisoning.” Brill explains that lamb’s quarters can absorb nitrates from contaminated soil and make you sick, so it’s best to be careful where you forage. Thayer points out that if you are one of those people who experience mild irritation on the tongue with spinach (as he does), then the same will most likely be the case with lamb’s quarters, so you might just want to add it to a stir fry instead of eating a full dish by its lonesome. 

As far as Gregg, Steve, and I are concerned, not one of us was noticeably poisoned, got sick, or even experienced irritated tongues. We did all share a funny sensation on our teeth afterwards, described by Steve as “sticky” and by Gregg as “very clean.” I would use the word “squeaky” myself. There was little cause for worry, however, as Steve says that spinach does the same thing to his teeth. 

Goosefoot Eaters 

Years ago, as an archaeology student at Bard College in upstate New York, I learned that Native American people ate goosefoot in the Northeast for thousands of years, as evidenced by carbon-dated, charred plant remains. Later, I read in more than one wild edible plants guide that European settlers were responsible for introducing goosefoot to North America. As you can imagine, this caused me some amount of cognitive dissonance.  

And then, thankfully, I picked up Samuel Thayer’s book, in which he debunks the introduced-species-argument as it pertains to Chenopodium using archeological evidence, concluding colorfully: “Apparently, like stinging nettle, black nightshade, human beings, and other cosmopolitan weeds, this species was indeed brought from Europe, but to a continent that already had its own indigenous strain.” I can’t tell you how much better I feel now. 

Not To Be Confused with Goose Feet

Last year when I was first getting back into this whole wild edible plants thing, I found a recipe for “Noodle and Goosefoot Casserole” in Common Edible and Medicinal Plants of Colorado. “That sounds awful,” Gregg replied to my eager prattle, not yet convinced on the whole wild food thing, the thought of actual goose feet baked in of copious amounts of cheese no doubt etching a painful image into his mind. 

As I said before, Gregg has since been fully converted, but it does tickle the funny bone to picture the scene in retrospect. And that, in turn, makes me to think about which of my unwitting friends plans to visit next… because goosefoot casserole does sound like an entertaining choice of meals to serve should the occasion present itself.

Tagged with: goosefoot • lamb's quarters • wild spinach

Filed under: edible • high altitude

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