June 21, 2005

• I would really be interested in this, but I can't understand most of it. I'm not a botanist, and it would be nice to have common names as well as scientific. I had been reading that in China during famine, leaves were pounded into a kind of flour to try to make some bread to eat.
• ...roses, violets, dianthus, nasturtiums, day lilies...from the Plant Foods listed by genus and species. Interesting though a sad topic, Zanshin -- )))!!!
• I thought mayonnaise and ketchup sandwiches were famine foods, (in place of tomatoes) apparently, its just something my grandparents ate during the Depression (and passed along to my mom, who...)
• Nasturtium flowers are great in salad. Rose petals are not bad, either (though of course they are more often used to make fritters).
• I just finished a book of American women's Indian captivity narratives that covers colonial times to the 1800s. Some of them cover in great detail about what the authors ate, and didn't eat, during their time as captives. One of the quotes that keeps sticking in my mind is "every bitter thing tastes sweet" when you're starving. Like jb, I wish I were better versed in botany so I could get more from this.
• I've been trying to use the search feature, but keep getting the dreaded "timed out" error. *sigh*
• Two Words. Shoe leather.
• Shoe leather. Don't laugh. During a recent hospital stay, I was served what I swear was boiled boot and library paste, though the menu claimed it was roast beef and mashed potatoes. And orange Jello for dessert. :p Am told by a friend who is a nurse that for every day you're in the hospital, it takes three to recover once you're home...