What is going on everyone? Kevin from Epic Gardening here. Welcome back to the

podcast. We're here with Marie Phil Eun. She's a forager writer,

cocktail master, the author of Forage Harvest Feast and the awesome blog 66 square feet so I would recommend you guys check all of those things out

Today we are talking about another amazing plant that you can forage and cultivate in your garden.

Fiddlehead ferns, which I do not know a whole lot about, Marie, I just know what they look

like and I know a couple ways that you could potentially prepare them, but again, not one that I have a lot of access to in my area.

So I'm going to lean on you for this and the first question I have which I don't know the answer

to is, is this a single species when we're talking about fiddlehead ferns or is this sort of a category?

That's a very good question, Kevin. I'm glad you asked that because whenever I'm talking in foraging forums about ferns that's hard to say everyone says oh that's not a

fiddlehead this is a fiddlehead fiddlehead really just refers to a fern front that is still curled up and the other name for a

fiddlehead is a crowsier that's like a really cute botanical name for a fiddlehead

it refers to any type of fern that hasn't unfurled its leaf.

But when people talk about fiddleheads to eat, they're really talking about one particular

species because it's the one that most North Americans eat.

When we move over to Asia we can start talking about other ferns that they eat, but the fiddlehead is the

ostrich fern. Its botanical name is Matusius, truthopterus, quite a mouthful. But it's the ostrich firm. So it's a very large

fern once it does actually unfurl it loves woodlands.

The fiddleheads are around and harvestable in mint to early spring. Round about the time that ramps reach markets in at least New York City

and they're delicious. It's a very beautiful thing to eat. It looks like this little violin head all curled up and they have this sort of sex appeal I think because you don't ever see them at least I don't in a regular supermarket or store it's got to be a

farmers market or a fancy restaurant and that's your fiddlehead. Yeah I would say

for anyone who has not seen what these look like do look them up it

looks like something that you would imagine out of a dream of a type of food just

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