Lamb’s quarters tomato sauce

Lamb’s quarters also known as fat hen, goosefoot or pigweed (not to be confused with redroot pigweed) are common names for a plant called Chenopodium album (literally white goosefoot). This wonderful wild edible is found worldwide. Formerly in the Goosefoot family (Chenopodiaceae) it has now been reclassified to the Amaranth family (Amaranthaceae). I think this is one of the taxonomic reclassifications that really makes sense – because lamb’s quarters is a more than suitable substitute for spinach which is also in the Amaranth family. I mean really – the taste and texture is incredibly similar.

Lamb’s quarters is a definite favourite in the wild food world, it is prolific, easy to grow, easy to harvest and easy to process. If you want to get into the nitty gritty details it is an annual, which means it relies on seeds for reproduction. This is a good tip to consider if you want to keep your lamb’s quarters patch producing year after year, or not. When young you can eat the whole plant, but as it gets older the stem become fibrous so best to chop off the leaves and growing tip.

To process I just pull up the plants whole, throw them into a bowl of cold water for 10 minutes, and take them out one by one cutting off roots and fibrous stems I don’t want to eat. The leaves are very waxy, and so the water and dirt just rolls off the leaves from my experience, once rinse is enough to avoid a gritty meal.

Lamb’s quarters in tomato sauce is a vegetable based recipe my partner and I (mostly my partner) came up with. We had a dispute about spicing, but being a trained cook he was right. Sorry no photos of the dish – it was just too good to document – and I can’t be working all the time! 🙂

Ingredients

• 6 cups lamb’s quarters (roughly chopped)
• 1/4 red onion (diced)
• 3 cloves garlic (minced)
• 3 tbsp olive oil
• 500g (1 large can) diced tomatoes
• 3 tbsp fresh basil (finely chopped)
• salt (to taste)
• pepper (to taste)

Directions

1. Clean and process lamb’s quarters (see above)
2. Sautée onions in olive oil on medium heat until soft and semi-translucent (5-10minutes)
3. Add garlic and tomatoes, simmer for 10 minutes
4. Add lamb’s quarters, cook until soft (2-5 minutes)
5. Add salt and pepper to taste
6. Remove sauce from heat and stir in basil
7. Serve with rice, pasta, bread or whatever else suits you

Serves 4-6 (depending on serving size)

If you are in the Calgary area and would like to learn more about wild edible urban plants, please join me on an upcoming plant walk.