If things are getting bad, just look about you. For those of you with no access right now due to winter I'll find some things you can eat even then for the next installment. Eg, see Balsam Fir, below.
I'm unable to post photos; maybe someone out there can help.
I did this research in 1998-99 when I was a Y2K survival-type. Looks like it may come in handy.
CHICORY:
It's common in roadsides and other disturbed soils, but doesn't seem to like acid soil. It's a good source of vitamins A and C, calcium, phosphorus, iron and potassium, plus trace minerals.
Dig up the roots, place them in boxes of composted sand (there are variations here) in a dark place indoors, keep them watered, at about 55 degrees, not too near the furnace, and in a few weeks or so you should get a crop of blanched leaves that you can use for salads.
From "Stalking the Wild Asparagus" by Euell Gibbons, p. 69ff:
"Chicory, although originally naturalized from Europe, is now a common roadside plant from Nova Scotia to Florida and West to the Plains. It is also found up and down the Pacific Coast and locally elsewhere. Succory is another name by which this plant is known, and on account of its pretty-colored but tattered-looking flowers it is called Blue Sailors or Ragged Sailors.
In early spring the first leaves that appear at the top of the perennial taproot greatly resemble those of the closely related dandelion in both size and shape. They are often gathered indiscriminately with dandelion leaves by those seeking spring greens. This is no misfortune, for the taste of the two is almost identical, and both are equally healthful.
In early summer the chicory puts up a loosely branched stalk that reaches two or three feet high, bearing slender, sparingly toothed leaves that are dark green in color with a purple midrib. In the axils of these leaves are the branches that bear the bright blue flowers, which are about two inches across and resemble a dandelion in form, but have ragged-looking edges because of the unevenness in length of the strap-shaped petals. These flowers are very erratic about opening and closing, seldom being found open after noon, except on cool, cloudy days.
As cooked greens, and even as raw salad, chicory is the equal of the dandelion, and that means it's tops. However, unless you gather the leaves while they are very young, you will be disappointed, for they soon become too bitter to eat. To get the finest chicory salad, you should almost be there to grab the first leaves as they form. The best tool is a weeder or asparagus knife, for the best part of the chicory is found underground.
"You don't so much pick this salad as dig it. Slide your tool underground and cut the root near the top. Trim off the root just high enough to keep the crown of leaves together. The white, underground parts of the leaves make an excellent salad, just washed and dressed with oil and vinegar. Or you can cook the whole top as a potherb, boiling it only a few minutes and seasoning with salt and butter. When collected early enough, chicory is unexcelled as a spring green.
From " Handbook of Edible Weeds" by James A. Duke, Ph.D. (botany):
Known to the Romans, chicory was mentioned by such early historians as Horace, Ovid, Pliny, and Virgil, and was early consumed as a vegetable or salad. Scorched roots, bitter as they are, have been used as a coffee...It is a shame that some good food can't be made from these easily available roots, abundant, easily harvested by pulling after a rain, and easy to recognize.
One of my favorite wild vegetable broths (bouillons) is made of chicory flowers, red clover flowers, and wild garlic flower heads (unopened), all easily available in Maryland in June...(Also), the attractive blue flowers can be used, fresh or pickled, in salads. The early spring shoots are almost as bitter as those of dandelion, relished by some, but too bitter for my jaundiced palate. Shoots, blanched by covering for weeks to keep light off, seem both more attractive and palatable, like the better and much more expensive Belgian Endive.
And from "Field Guide to Edible Wild Plants" by Bradford Angier,
(The leaves) provide greens for salads and for cooking. As these leaves grow older they, like those of the dandelion, become more and more bitter, encouraging some cooks to drain off the first boiling water and then to simmer to tenderness in the second.
Raw chicory greens, although over 92% water, have for each 100 grams of the edible portion 86 milligrams of calcium, 40 mg. of phosphorus, .9 mg. of iron, 420 mg. of potassium, plus no less than 4,000 international units of Vitamin A, 22 mg. of Vitamin C, and goodly traces of thiamine, riboflavin, and niacin.
Much of the chicory root used on this continent as a coffee substitute, stretcher, and flavorer is imported from Europe, but exactly the same roots grow wild right here at home. If you'd like to proceed on your own, just dig some of the long roots, scrub them with a brush, and then roast them slowly in a partly open oven until they will break crisply between the fingers, exposing a dark brown interior. Then grind and store in a closed container...
CRABGRASS (Digitaria sanguinalis):
Briefly, Crabgrass is a clumped, mat-forming annual herb, rooting at the nodes of the horizontal stems, 6-30 inches tall. For more details let me know, or see the Rodale book "Controlling Weeds." Regarding my use of parentheses and ellipses, please see Quack-grass, below.
Again, pretty much straight from the texts:
("Crabgrass)...is cultivated, according to Loudon, 'in the cottage gardens in Poland,' the seeds being used as a substitute for rice. Unger states that (they) furnish a wholesome and palatable nutriment and that the plant 'is cultivated here and there on poor, sandy soils.'" (primary quote from Edible Wild Plants of Eastern North America, by Fernald and Kinsey, p. 103-4; inner quotes from the following: Arboretum et Fruticetum Britannicum, 2d ed., by J. C. Loudon, 1844; and On the Principal Plants used as Food by Man, by F. Unger, 1860)
"The grains...are edible and were highly praised by the Slavs. Crabgrass was at one point cultivated in Poland as a cereal plant." (The Encyclopedia of Edible Plants of North America, by Francois Couplan, Ph.D., p. 471)
"Seeds, minute though they are, may be stripped off and used to make porridge, beverages (fermented to make beer), or toasted and ground to make flour. When cutting the fruiting plants in August with a hand scythe, I find the seeds congregate in large masses on the blade. These I have scraped off and cooked to make a poor man's oatmeal.
"A single plant may set as many as 150,000 seeds. Even in the temperate zone, it can produce 2-3 seed crops per season, seeding from early summer to frost. Seeds are substituted for rice in Poland and for grits elsewhere. Tropical species of Digitaria may yield more than 17 tons biomass per acre in a year...
"Almost all grasses are safe sources of cereals, (but) CAUTION: Grasses and cereals may be moldy, especially in damp periods of the year. Black molds are particularly dangerous. Wilted grasses should also be avoided, as they may contain cyanide. Fruits of many wild grasses, as well as cultivated cereals, may have stiff hairs which can lodge in the throat, causing serious irritation. Such hairs should be removed somehow, by winnowing or burning."(Handbook of Edible Weeds, by James A. Duke, Ph.D.(botany), p. 86-7)
BALSAM FIR:
One of the most available (and highly concentrated) emergency foods of the North, though one disagreeable to eat, is the pitchy balsam found in the blisters on the bark of Balsam Fir (Abies balsamea). This is reported to have saved lives in the woods...Presumably the southern Abies fraseri has similar possibilities." (Edible Wild Plants of Eastern North America, by Fernald and Kinsey, p. 38, 80)
QUACK-GRASS (Agropyron repens):
Why Quack-grass? Because it's extremely common and few people know it as a wild edible.
I'll try to give you these pretty much straight from the texts. Any omissions (shown by an ellipsis) represent material that I felt was less relevant, but if anyone's interested, let me know. Here and there I've added words or phrases in parentheses for the purpose of clarification or for making the broken text read more smoothly.
"...the British botanist, Withering, wrote: 'The roots (actually rhizomes, which are underground horizontal roots) dried and ground for meal, have been used to make bread in years of scarcity.'" (Edible Wild Plants of Eastern North America, by Fernald & Kinsey, p. 95)
"The tender new tips of the rhizomes...are edible raw in the spring. The whole rhizome can be dried, ground and sifted to remove the fibers. Cakes and breads have been made with the resulting flour in times of famine (and) the grains are edible." (The Encyclopedia of Edible Plants of North America, by Francois Couplan, Ph.D., p. 465-66)
"...the (rhizomes), sometimes chewed like licorice, can be scorched and used as a coffee substitute (and) seeds...can be used for making breadstuffs. (Caution): Although foragers use the rule of thumb that all grasses are edible, wilted grasses sometimes contain dangerous levels of cyanide, and in wetter climates, tainted grains may cause ergot poisoning." (Handbook of Edible Weeds, by James A. Duke, Ph.D.(botany))
The above references were all I could find from a search of about 25 books on wild edible plants. If anyone can contribute to this material, fantastic. Quack-grass is usually seen as a weedy-type of grass that spreads quickly through lawns once it takes hold. It has thin, three-to-six- jointed stems that grow in a clump from the base of the plant. The leaf-blades are usually a bluish-green. Rodale's "Controlling Weeds" has some good photos on page 86; or see Ortho's "All About Lawns", p. 74 for another.
STINGING NETTLE (Urtica dioica):
"I am probably the only forager you'll read about who has eaten the stinging nettles raw, although most foragers have enjoyed them cooked. (Julie Summers may have reported a raw nettle repast somewhere in the pages of COLTSFOOT.) The raw nettles quit stinging by the time they get to the throat, at least in my trials."
(Handbook of Edible Weeds, by James A. Duke, Ph.D.(botany), p. 204)
MILKWEED:
The Indians (not sure which tribes) used the coagulated milk from the stems (from the boiling process) as a chewing gum, according to the Handbook of Edible Weeds, p. 40 (by James A. Duke, PhD (botany)). Dr. Duke tried this personally, with success.
And if you're still into the milkweed (Asclepias syriaca and Asclepias speciosa are the milkweeds generally recognized as edible), just be aware that there are some poisonous look-alikes: Dogbanes, especially Hemp Dogbane (Apocynum cannabinum), which, like milkweed, has opposite leaves and milky sap. And stay away from the narrow-leaved milkweed species, especially Butterfly Weed (Asclepias tuberosa). If you'd like more detailed descriptions of any of these, let me know.
This will be Part I of a series. Hope it's useful.