Thanks to restrictions imposed to mitigate the ongoing pandemic, many people are remembering the simple pleasures of walking, bicycle riding and cooking. Revealed weaknesses in the supply chains on which we depend for food have likely contributed to growing interest in gardening as well as in foraging for wild edibles.
Locally, we are graced by large numbers of tasty wild plants, at least if you recognize that which you seek. A walk in the wood can provide a variety of leaves and fruits on which to nibble.
Today you might find blackberries, elderberry flowers and the asparagus-like young shoots of various species of catbrier. About half of the weeds in vegetable gardens are edible, with my favorite the radish-like roots of Florida hedge nettle, also known as betony.
Admittedly, all this nibbling may leave you in need of more substantial sustenance, like bread. Fortunately, bread-root plants, known by our predecessors as “kunti” or “coontie,” abound hereabouts. Our wild landscapes are graced by white coontie, a native cycad in the genus Zamia, and are infested with a half dozen species of red coontie, also known as catbrier, thorny climbers in the genus Smilax.
I advise against eating white coontie. Even after you pound, leach and ferment the stem tuber starch, it’s still toxic. Plus, it takes white coontie decades to reach harvestable size.
Due to their prickly and wire-strong stems, few people are enamored with red coontie. Nevertheless, starch concentrations in catbrier rhizomes vie with potatoes, and I once dug up a wheelbarrow full in just under an hour.
I am convinced that red coontie was truly the staff of life for locals, but we’ve lost an essential bit of traditional knowledge needed for its preparation. It’s true that recipes for preparing flour from red coontie were recorded by William “Puc Puggy” Bartram when he wandered here back in the 1770s.
Unfortunately, I’ve tried multiple variations on his procedures with little luck; I can’t separate the starch from the fibers and failed to leach away the tannins that turn the mash red. The best I did with five pounds of red coontie and hours of labor, resembled a bitter communion wafer. My red coontie beer was worse than my muscadine wine, but both served well on gummed up carburetors.
Hopefully a local culinary master will figure out how to extract food from catbrier rhizomes and thereby help alleviate our concerns about local food shortages.
Francis E. "Jack" Putz is a distinguished professor of biology and forestry at the University of Florida.
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May 28, 2020 at 11:36AM
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F.E. ‘Jack’ Putz: Florida is graced with tasty wild plants - Sarasota Herald-Tribune
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