Going Brand-Nettle Collecting!

It is that time of the year when all the greenery starts growing like crazy... and especially the stinging Brand-Nettles that inhabit the parks and public green areas in our town. At our kid's school... they send out the toddlers armed with huge oversized kitchen washing up gloves to collect these plants and then make them into a quite delicious soup! The first time that it happened (for our oldest...) we thought that it was an outdoor exercise that was just asking for trouble!

However, each year... it has turned out to be quite successful... and without any serious disasters. This year, the event is obviously cancelled as there is no school at the moment... but the Peutergroep (Kindergarten) sent out the recipe for all of us who were interested in trying it out. Both our kids have great memories of how tasty the soup was... and my wife did as well, she did have a taste one year. Meanwhile, I haven't had the pleasure of trying it out yet... but I will soon!

... so the weather has been great these past weeks here in The Netherlands, and we made a plan to go out to the local green park to collect some of these Brand-nettles. The idea was to get about half a kilo of the leaves as that was what the recipe called for. Following the suggestions from the kindergarten, we were looking to collect mostly the tips and new shoots of the plants, as these were supposed to be less bitter than the grown leaves nearer to the bottom of the plant. Also, to try avoid any flowers...

Both my wife and I had to look up exactly what the Brand-nettles looked like... we didn't grow up here and have had no terrible experiences of being stung by these plants... however, both our kids knew exactly what to look for.

If you look at the picture above, you can see that leaves and stems have lots of these little stiff needles... which stick into your skin and sting and itch like crazy! I was the only person stupid enough to get one my hands this morning.... it was only a single needle, and you can feel it! Still, only a single needle and I was able to see it and pull it out before it became troublesome... but I could definitely understand how a few more would be most unpleasant!

Mission accomplished... we had a large plastic bag full of the juicy tips!... and aside from one stupid father, no casualties!

We were the only people doing it... so I wonder what the people walking near us thought... we were in the brush with washing up gloves... pulling at leaves and dumping them in a big bag!

Even without the mission of Brand-nettle collection... it is a nice park to do a Springtime walk in... the kids had their scooters to get around and the weather was pleasant and not windy at all (which is quite a nice change when you live in The Netherlands!). This particular monument (the last photo) is quite a popular meeting area for the local people... you often see people exercising in the area or reading or just having a picnic... and there was a time when you would also see hordes of Pokemon hunters as well!