Gardener's Revenge Soup - Stinging Nettle

For years, stinging nettles have infested our back wildflower garden: They look a lot like some of the plants we want (sort of halfway between raspberry's fuzziness and the slightly rounder four-way axial leaves of Queen of the Prairie), and the stems break off at ground level, leaving a network of robust runner roots to re-sprout. I'm not terribly sensitive to them, but SueF is, and won't go anywhere near that garden bed.

Well, this year, I'm taking revenge. Armed with a trowel, I got out a lot (I'm sure not all) of the roots, stripped the leaves from the stems, and made soup.

As soups go, it's pretty basic:
1/2 an onion, diced
2Tbs butter, separated
1/2 lb potatoes, peeled and small diced
1/2 tsp salt + to taste
black pepper to taste
big pinch of fresh nutmeg
3C chicken stock

Sweat the onion in one tbs of butter and the salt until translucent.
Add the stock and potatoes, bring to boil, reduce to simmer for 15 minutes.
Add the nettles, pepper and nutmeg, simmer another 10.
Add second tbs butter.
Puree with stick blender, serve with yogurt or sour cream.

Frankly, it's beautiful, but not all that flavorful of a soup. It reminds me a bit of a shrimp bisque without the fishiness, but that might be the black pepper and potato talking (a pinch of Old Bay might be good, though).

Harvested Greens:


Meez:


Finished Soup:

(stoneware: Taylorstone Cathay, inherited from my mother-in law, a midmod classic)

Possible suggestion for SueF. Get a pair of rubber dish washing gloves and the nettles can't hurt you.

JoelF wrote:(stoneware: Taylorstone Cathay, inherited from my mother-in law, a midmod classic)

The bowl does your soup proud. That really looks great. So green!

=R=

Hi,

One of my cooking clubs dealt with foraged foods recently. One was nettles with an English woman wearing dishwashing gloves. Another a Turkish woman who likes the sting feeling it helps with her arthritis. If she wants to minimize the sting, she rubs olive oil onto her skin.

Regards,
Cathy2

ronnie_suburban wrote:

JoelF wrote:(stoneware: Taylorstone Cathay, inherited from my mother-in law, a midmod classic)

The bowl does your soup proud. That really looks great. So green!

=R=

Hmm, images not showing up for me.

Darren72 wrote:

ronnie_suburban wrote:

JoelF wrote:(stoneware: Taylorstone Cathay, inherited from my mother-in law, a midmod classic)

The bowl does your soup proud. That really looks great. So green!

=R=

Hmm, images not showing up for me.

Me neither—viewing on iPhone.

Should be working now, I think. Google Photos is not the most cooperative.

JoelF wrote:Should be working now, I think. Google Photos is not the most cooperative.

Gorgeous! Going to go search for those dishes now...

Yes, looks great-thanks!

boudreaulicious wrote:

JoelF wrote:Should be working now, I think. Google Photos is not the most cooperative.

Gorgeous! Going to go search for those dishes now...

I've got two coffee cups and saucers over and above service for 12. If you need to fill those in let me know. I was short a few soup bowls, picked them up on eBay at a reasonable price.