Shooting Times & Country Magazine
Let’s cut corners
The three-cornered leek is an edible invasive species simply begging to be foraged, writes John Wright
On occasions, foragers suffer from the ire of the permanently sanctimonious. There are few greater pleasures than selfrighteousness, but it is a hollow joy and a firm contender for the eighth deadly sin.
I have frequently been shouted at in woodlands for being in possession of a mushroom basket. People have phoned emergency lines to report my presence, they have called the police and I have been banned from leading mushroom forays in Dorset on National Trust land, though this ban was subsequently rescinded after I made my case.
In fact, I am an extremely restrained forager and teach people on my forays to be the same. I will walk past hundreds of the highly prized penny bun mushrooms (ceps) if I already have one or two in my basket, tread carefully around marsh samphire patches and collect sea kale broccoli only once every few years.
With the common forageables, however, I will pick everything I can and need. Blackberries fall before my walking stick by the kilo (55kg being my best year) and I pick stinging nettles by the truckload.
I think this is all very virtuous of me, but what if there were something even more deserving of a commendation?
As it happens, there is: picking invasive species.
One such is the infuriating Himalayan balsam. Very carefully put plastic over the mature seed-pods of Himalayan balsam to collect the exploding seeds. You then rip the rest of the plant out of the ground. The seeds are pleasant when toasted like sesame seeds, though you must make sure you don’t transfer live seeds to anywhere else.
Oyster catching
Much better than toasty seeds are oysters, Pacific oysters. This species was introduced decades ago to replace the partially lost and troubled stocks of native oysters. They were allowed in British waters on the understanding that they would not breed in the low temperatures around our coast.
Unfortunately, every now and then, the sea surface temperature has risen above the critical 18°C and they have spawned. I have seen them grow in their thousands in the south west, usually on sea walls or in pebbly estuaries. In some places, they can form a solid, edible pavement.
I purify them for a day in a shallow tray of 3.5% salt water, splashing every now and then to keep the water oxygenated. Then I cook them, as you can’t eat raw oysters that have not
been professionally cleansed without risking a couple of days confined to your quarters.
More accessible and a complete gift to the forager, is the threecornered leek, Allium triquetrum.
It is a Mediterranean species that arrived in Britain in the late 19th century, starting in the warmer south before struggling its way north. It is still a primarily southern species with a strong coastal tendency, demonstrating its preference for the warmth of its homeland. When you find the plant, you will find them in their hundreds, close packed in dense patches and evicting native species.
Sniff test
It is an easy plant to identify. The leaves are long, thin at a centimetre or so, and a very shallow ‘V’ shape in section. Even when mature, they won’t be winning prizes at any of the Northumberland annual leek competitions, the stem, such as it is, being little thicker than a pencil.
They taste and smell of onions. The flowers arrive in late March and April, forming on the distinctly triangularsection stem that provides the plant with its Latin name. These flowers are superficially similar to snowdrops, but have a thin, green line running down the middle of each lobe. As with all plants in the Alliaceae family, it is essential not to mix it up with any of the flowering bulbs as several of these are poisonous. A sniff of a crushed leaf will leave you in no doubt.
All parts of the plant are edible — leaf, stem, bulb and flower — though the triangular flower stem is a little fibrous. The flowers, like those of wild garlic, make pretty decorations on salads and soups. The general flavour is more in the direction of onion than leek and, with such vast swathes available, I cut bags full of it to use in a vegetable stock.
As it matures, it will produce a substantial bulb and the whole uprooted plant will look like a spring onion. The bulbs are the best part, in my opinion, though they will be quite small until the middle of March. They remind me of those translucent silverskin onions you find looking at you from pickle jars. It is certainly the best of the few wild varieties, beating even the wild onion, Allium vineale.
The leaves and thinner stems of three-cornered leek are around from mid-december until April and, with
“The flowers, like those of wild garlic, make pretty decorations on salads and soups”
such an invasive species, it will make little difference when you pick it or how much.
There is one wild leek that is seldom found in the countryside, instead making a living in only a few of the big cities. At the moment, it seems to be restricted to Edinburgh, Leeds, Cambridge and odd bits of Sussex, though why so choosy I do not know. I was in Edinburgh in late March a few years ago and it was pestilential in its extent. The plant in question is fewflowered leek, Allium paradoxum, a mean plant with but a single leaf and, well, few flowers on its stem. It does, however, produce tasty and succulent bulbils on the flower-head. It would form a great public service if you ate as many of these plants as you could.
Towards the end of February, there is a chance that the first of the wild garlic, Allium ursinum, will be visible, peeping out of the leaf litter. I am of the opinion that it is at its best when very young, becoming tougher and more bitter with age, to the point of rankness by late spring. Very nice with Pacific oysters.