Eat Good Food

Nettles are an herbaceous perennial that usually grow near streams, and lend themselves well to pestos, stews, and frittatas.

Not domesticated, nettles are foraged rather than harvested. Covered in stinging hairs that can raise welts that last for days, nettles should be gathered while wearing gloves and long sleeves.

Spring is the best time to collect them, when they’re young and the stems are tender, before flowers appear.

Nettles can’t take the heat, so you’ll rarely find them out in the open or in dry patches. Look for them in riparian habitats and in cool dells under the trees. And do look for that. Nettles are a fleeting treat of spring and well worth the careful effort they demand, both for their health benefits and the pure lovely taste of green they offer.

History

• Ancient Greeks and Romans recommended nettles as a cure-all, used to treat ailments ranging from dog bites to nosebleeds to asthma.
• Nettles spin into fabric and were used in the Bronze Age as burial shrouds.
• Native American peoples have long used nettle fiber for twine, fishing nets, and rope.
• Folklore abounds about stinging nettles. A story called “A Boy and the Nettles” appears in Aesop’s Fables.

Tidbits and Terminology

• In Great Britain, nettles have been brewed in beer for thousands of years.
• There is a strong tradition in Northern Europe and Russia of using nettles in soups.
• The stinging hairs are known as trichomes, and contain a mixture of histamine, serotonin, and formic acid.
• Nettles are sometimes used to deliberately sting people, in a procedure known as urtication.

Cultivation and Harvest

• The stinging nettle is known in the plant world as Urtica dioica. It grows wild in forests and woodlands, often near streams and rivers, throughout North America, Europe, parts of Asia, Russia, and northern Africa.
• Not all nettles are stinging, but most, if not all, of what grows in North America is of the stinging variety.
• Nettles grow in a similar fashion to mint. As the plant matures, the leaves sprout from the stem in a towering fashion, and with age, the stem hardens and becomes more fibrous.
• Nettle plants can grow stalks up to 10 feet tall. The flowers, which appear in late spring or summer, indicate that the nettles are past their prime for eating.
• When foraging, keep in mind that roadside nettles are subject to constant vehicle emissions.
• Nettles are a source of food for all kind of insects, butterflies, moths, and birds, as well as an egg-laying haven for ladybugs.

Nutritional Information

Nettles are a natural detoxifier and anti-inflammatory remedy. For millennia, the stinging nettle has been used to treat such physical ailments as gout, anemia, and joint pain. In recent years, they have also been noted for their potential in treating diabetes and seasonal allergies.

Storage

Once picked, nettles are extremely perishable. For short-term storage, keep them in the refrigerator wrapped in a moist towel. For longer-term storage, blanch the nettles in salted boiling water for one minute, drop in ice water, drain, then place into bags for freezing.

At a Glance: Cooking Tips

• Exercise caution by wearing gloves when chopping fresh nettles.
• Like spinach and chard, the nettle is a quick-cooking green and can be folded into everything from egg dishes to pastas.
• Nettles can easily be dried for use in tea or as a powdered supplement. Just place them in a dehydrator, low temperature oven, or let them dry in the sun.

Italians make nettle pesto, or pesto d’urtica, in springtime. This recipe from Michael Ruhlmann highlights the clean, fresh flavors of the nettle.

Nettle Pesto
Makes four 8-ounce jars

8 cups of nettles
1 cup Parmesan or Pecorino Romano
1 cup walnuts
5 garlic cloves, peeled
Juice of half a lemon
½ teaspoon kosher salt
A few turns of the pepper mill
½ cup olive oil

Drop the nettles into a large pot of boiling salted water.

Blanch the nettles for 3 minutes. With a slotted spoon, move them into an ice water bath to shock and cool.

Squeeze out all the liquid and give the nettles a rough chop. You should have about 3 cups of cooked greens.

Place the nettles into your food processor along with cheese, walnuts, garlic cloves, lemon juice, kosher salt, freshly ground black pepper, and olive oil. Process to the desired consistency, adding more oil if needed.