Welcome back to the Lost In the Farmer’s Market blog. As some of you have noticed the blog has taken on a more formal instructional tone to cover the wide variety of forage foods that you can find all around you. This change came about due to the events of the pandemic, economic turmoil and other factors. The reality is that we are surrounded with perfectly edible plants that can fill at least some of the void in our dietary needs but, there is a multi-million dollar herbicide industry that exists. It has always been in the interest of that industry to label certain things ‘weeds’ so they can sell you product that as time goes by we find out is worse for your health than the weeds are. Coupled with an Agricultural-Education system that peddles the myths of the industry and the old myth that if you can afford a nice lawn you must have wealth we have a population that has been fooled for a long time. So, here we are in 2023, and the forage foods series will continue. I hope all of you who read this blog find the information useful or at least thought provoking. The ‘weeds’ I am listing a certainly found in Zone 8A in North Carolina and should certainly be easy to find in the Southeast regions of America. Oh, and one funny thing discovered in last year’s blog, it turns out you can eat Crab Grass, and while it isn’t what most would call a lawn grass, I did state you can’t eat your lawn in last year’s intro. Detailed research is a funny thing since it has a way of proving even the experts wrong.
New growth looks like this, note how bright green it is. 
The flower clusters are quite visible, even when driving by at 40+ miles per hour. 
New shoots can be up to 12 feet tall! 
More flowers more foliage, but notice what is in the lower left corner. Wild Blackberries (Rubus armeniacus) often grow in the same spots Common Elderberry does and that should tell you a lot. 
Also Green Briar (Smilax rotundifolia) also grows in the same spots that Common Elderberry does so be wary of thorns, ticks and mosquitoes.
Common Name: Common Elderberry
Other Common Names: American Elder, Common Elder American Elderberry, Elderberry.
Botanical Family: Adoxaceae (The Moschatel Family)
Botanical Latin Name: Sambucus canadensis
Description & Habitat: Common Elderberry is best described as shrubby, it reaches a height of roughly 6 to 13 feet, and has upright spreading branches that emerge from a crown that can be pretty wide but often is rounded. The leaves are borne in opposite arrangement and are deciduous while having a pinnate-compound form. There can be up to eleven leaflets on a given petiole (leaf stem). The flowers are white and borne in clusters that resemble those umbrella-shaped clusters in the Carrot family. The following fruit are often reddish-black, round and require preparation to use. Common Elderberry is most commonly found in fairly rich moist soils that are on the edge of forests, by streams and river banks, fencerows and along roadsides. All of the specimens pictured were found along a roadside that borders a swampy area that was across the road from a municipal dump. Chances are if you see standing water or the water table is high in the soil these perennial bushes will do very well.
When & What to Harvest: The flower petals and the fruit are what you want. To harvest the flower petals pick whole clusters of flowers once they are fully opened and shake the petals off into a container. Fruit should be picked when it is a rich purple color, you should try to pick individual berries rather than the entire cluster so that you can come back to harvest again later.
Poisonous Lookalikes: Blue Elder (Sambucus cerulea), the raw berries contain a toxin that can cause potentially severe nausea. Although the fruit is not a look alike I have to list Red Fruited Elder (S. pubens) and Pacific Elder (S. callicarpa) here.
Related Edible Species: Mexican Elder (S. Mexicana), Black Berried Elder (S. melocarpa)
Recipe: The first thing I have to note here is that the inedible parts of this plant are the leaves, stems roots, seeds and unripe fruits. These parts can be toxic due to presence of cyanogenic glycosides and alkaloids. Typically when you are making a juice or jelly out of the fruit the seeds are strained out as part of processing making the resulting food safe to eat.
Flower Clusters
Dip the flower clusters in light batter and deep fry it. Add some powdered sugar to the resulting fried food and you have a confectionery delight. You can also drizzle it with honey or add in a fruit juice to add some additional flavor.
Berries, Juice
Extracting Elderberry
juice from fresh fruit is a fairly straightforward operation; simmer a mixture
of one cup water to one cup of mashed berries for about 25 minutes then strain
the mix through cloth to remove the seeds and pulp. Sweeten to taste with honey
or sugar or use to add flavor to other juices. This juice will be quite high in
vitamin C which can mean life or death if you are out in the wilderness. If you are planning to make a jam the process is the same as making a juice but you would be cooking it more, adding more sugar and lemon juice and possibly adding pectin.
With all that garden goodness covered this is the part of the blog where I have to advertise for the Fayetteville City Market. Now I know you readers probably don’t much like advertisements, but by booth at the City Market helps to cover the costs of running the test garden and literally maintains the Research & Development budget that is used to bring you the information that has made up the backbone of this blog. In addition to being able to process card payments we now take CashApp payments so your payment options for my product have tripled. With that said; if you want to get some GMO-free, Organic fruit, herbs, flowers and perennials, come on down to the Fayetteville City Market on 325 Maxwell Street in downtown Fayetteville between the Hours of 9:00 am and 2:00 pm on Saturdays. Even in bad weather the market goes on though you might have to look for me under the ‘arches’ of the Transportation Museum’s front entryway.
For those of you wondering what plants are going to be at the market this weekend here is the list.
Spring Garden Plants:
Broccoli, Imperial
Collards, Variegated
Kale, Beira
Kale, Lacinato ‘Black Magic’
Kale, Redbor
Leeks, King Richard
Mustard, Japanese Red Giant
Spinach, Green Beret
Sorrel, Raspberry Dressing
Coming Soon:
Expect other cool season plants soon; the warm season lineup will be available in April.
How to stay in Contact with Us!
Our group’s online presence has migrated to Nextdoor.com. All you need to keep up with all our activities is to have a Nextdoor account and to look for the ‘Sustainable Neighbors of Fayetteville’ group and ask to join! You don’t have to live in Fayetteville to join us! Feel free to ask all your garden questions of our knowledgeable membership and post your cool garden pictures.
Sustainable Neighbors of Fayetteville
Also please take a gander at the YouTube version of this blog:
The Videos: Look Here
>Newest videos (1): Chinese Fringe Bush
We have two meetings a month. We meet at LeClair’s General Store on the First and Third Thursday of every month. It’s an open-door meeting with no membership requirements just come on in and talk garden with us! Our next meeting is on April 6th between 5:30pm and 7:00pm. We are in the back room so come on in and join us for a fun garden chat.
