Foraging Fun!
My daughter and her friends have recently gotten into brewing potions and eating weeds. One night, they came into my kitchen with handfuls of “Onion Grass” (this is what we call it, but you probably know it as Wild Garlic (Allium vineale)).
The girls excitedly asked what we could make with it, and I suggested scrambled eggs with lots of butter. They fried the alliums up in the butter, added beaten eggs, and enjoyed it so much that they made ANOTHER pan of eggs.
So, when the violets started blooming, they knew those were edible too and asked me what we could make with them. I pulled up a recipe from The Spruce Eats for a simple violet syrup. The girls were delighted to pick the flowers and separate the petals from the stems and calyxes. They had so much patience for this, I was really impressed. Then we filled the jar with the boiled water and waited 24 hours before adding sugar. They enjoyed the results over a bowl of vanilla ice cream (I was too busy preventing 3rd helpings to even get a photo!)
The syrup was really fun due to the beautiful color. It’s mostly just a sweet, simple syrup, but there is a very delicate note of violet in there, and it was just a fun foraging activity to do with my kid and her friends. Violets are full of healthy stuff, which you can Google on your own, which is a super sweet bonus.
Another way we love to use violets is to freeze them in ice cube trays to use with water or lemonade in the summer. They are so pretty, and it’s just super fun!
I hope you also have fun eating some weeds with your family!