Mustard Greens

Mustard Greens
Originally uploaded by suebobdavis.

While walking the dog in Wildwood Park today, I picked some mustard greens in honor of my mom, who lived through the Great Depression.

She says "We never went hungry, but we ate a lot of mustard greens." She says you have to cook them with bacon fat to make them taste right.

Some of the plants are almost 6 feet tall by now and beginning to bloom.

I picked new shoots from plants no more than 2 feet tall because I heard smaller plants had a milder flavor. Some have just a little zip, but others taste almost like horseradish!

One particular set of leaves I tasted made my eyes widen and water and my nose involuntarily wrinkle up -- strong stuff!