Dandelion Jelly

Spring greens are in full swing here on the farmstead. We enjoyed chickweed salads last week, and the purple dead nettle is blooming everywhere. The dandelions have been tempting me for the last few days, and after thinking it over I began entertaining the idea of dandelion flower jelly.
 
There are other recipes for dandelion jelly floating around the interwebs, but I worked this one out because it uses a homemade pectin stock, which is pretty cool. The recipe is based on the Tea Jelly recipe in Canning for a New Generation, by Lianna Krissoff. It uses homemade fruit pectin made from granny smith apples.

For the sake of brevity, I will cut right to the recipe, and save a treatise on preparing the flowers for another post. Just know in advance that you need to separate the flower petals from the small green leaves on the back side of the flower. It's tedious, but not quite as bad as it sounds.

 This is a pretty simple recipe. The last time I made jams and jellies was when I was nine or ten and  "helping" my mom. Mostly by getting underfoot. So I was delighted that this went as well as it did and came together so easily.

The taste of the finished jelly reminds me of honey. I think the light apple flavor of the stock goes really well in this case. It isn't overpowering and it adds a nice dimension to the jelly.

Ingredients: 

2 or 3 cups fresh dandelion petals
2 1/4 cups boiling water
3 cups of homemade green apple pectin
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice (strained)
3 1/4 cups sugar

Makes 3 half pint jars, and can be water bath canned.

Have sterilized jars, lids, and rings ready to go.

To make the jelly:

Put the petals into a heat proof bowl and pour the boiling water over them. Cover the bowl with a plate and steep for ten minutes, or until the petals have lost most of their color.

Pour the dandelion petal brew through a strainer into a six to eight quart pan. Add the green apple pectin, lemon juice and sugar to the petal water, and bring to a boil over high heat. Keep an eye on it to make sure it doesn't boil over and make a mess.

Cook until the temp reaches 220 degrees Fahrenheit (use a candy thermometer to check).

Ladle into sterilized jars, lid up, and water bath process for five minutes. Also, enjoy the jelly left in the bottom of the pot that the ladle couldn't get- bread or crackers not required, but a large serving spoon is recommended because the pot will probably still be very hot. :) 

Mmm! Dandelion Jelly!

Herbal Honeys

Winter doesn't suit me. I get fretful and anxious, and tend to only want to do two things: read and sleep. Well, I suppose you could also add a few other things to that list: 3.) cuddle (cats, humans, extra quilts, whatever-I'm equal opportunity) and 4.) drink copious amounts of hot tea. Everything else is a dreadful inconvenience. This year things certainly weren't helped by a hefty dollop of grief and more pressure than usual to keep up the frenetic pace I manage for most of the rest of the year. Finally, I blew off everything and nosed around in my herb cabinet in a sulky mood until I found some ingredients that captured my fancy. Combining them with my adoration of all things hot and beverage-y, I came up with three herbal honeys that can either be stirred into water to make an instant tea, used to sweeten less palatable herbal brews, or to add another dimension to already yummy infusions.

The time to play left me in a much better mood.

Herbal honeys need about two weeks to mature, so that the flavors develop. It's been about a month since I made these, so they have had plenty of time for the flavors to meld.

The two I have been using the most are the Turmeric/Long Pepper/Black Pepper spice blend (I like to add it to other teas when I feel a scratchy throat and sinus woes forthcoming) and also the Ginger/Sage/Astragalus immune friendly blend. The Hibiscus/Rose/Lemon Balm one hasn't come out to play much just yet, but I planned it as a tasty vitamin c treat. The fourth one is an Angelica/Lavender/Rose Petal nervine. I think I might save the recipes for another post, but I am pleased that they turned out very pretty as well as delicious. Or maybe that's just me adoring the presentation of anything in tiny jelly jars?

Cardinal Flower, Lobelia Cardinalis

Lobelia cardinalis, commonly known as cardinal flower, is a North American native wildflower that can be found in most US states outside of the Northwest. L. Cardinalis is a perennial that enjoys moist soil, such as by a stream or pond, and it prefers sun or partial shade. The flowers attract hummingbirds and rely on them for pollination. 

Although cardinal flower is related to the common herb Lobelia (lobelia inflata), it is not generally used by modern herbalists. Historical herbalists, such as the eclectics, also have little to say about it.

Lloyd and Lloyd, in Drugs and Medicines of North America, 1884-1887, note the use of an infusion or powder of the plant for worms, but it is based on written mention of the herb by two other authors. A third author is mentioned, Johann David Schoepf of Materia Medica Americanna, as having said that L. cardinalis had similar properties to Lobelia syphilitica, but Lloyd and Lloyd felt that Schoepf knew little about it regardless.

However, ethnobotanical resources, such as the USDA plants database and the University of Michigan's Ethnobotany database, confirm that cardinal flower originally had many herbal uses. The Cherokee and Iroquois seem to have used it extensively, and several other tribes used it occasionally.

Some common traditional uses included: 

• Use of the cooled infusion of the plant to stem nosebleeds
• A decoction of the whole plant given for sicknesses caused by grieving
• An infusion of the leaves taken internally for colds, fevers, and rheumatism
• Poultices made out of the roots were used externally for sores (especially those taking a long time to heal), fever blisters, injuries, swelling and rheumatism
• As part of treatment for croup, syphilis, typhoid, and tuberculosis 

Other traditional applications of cardinal flower included uses as an analgesic, anticonvulsive, antispasmodic and gynecological aid.

Additionally, the Iroquois believed it to strengthen other herbs when used in conjunction with them.

In many ways, the uses of L. cardinalis appear to overlap those of L. inflata, although L. inflata was more commonly used as an emetic and to address spasms, epileptic conditions and issues of the lungs. However, both types of lobelia are considered to be potentially toxic, with overuse or abuse by humans possibly leading to paralysis, coma and death.