Video Episode: Botanical Taste Test

Hey, plant lovers and plant killers.

I'm Jonathan.

And I'm Jeanette.

We're two old high school friends, current

geriatric millennials, Plant Sluts, the podcast where plants meet pop culture, sex, gossip, and

all the dirt in between.

Coming to you from a backyard in

Salem, Oregon and a rooftop in Montreal, Quebec.

We're Plant Sluts.

We're Plant Sluts.

Oh, my God. This episode we have a little something different in store for you.

So if you're listening to in audio version, we would recommend that you follow the link in the description to actually go to the video of it.

Yeah, well, I was in Montreal. I recorded live with John in his greenhouse and we did a little tri weed segment.

Yeah. And I hope you enjoy.

I totally forgot we were recording this and I was just thinking of the audio. So we're in Montreal in Jonathan's greenhouse and we're going to do a little special episode where we try weeds, not weed.

We're not going to smoke up here.

We could, but we won't.

So what we found all these really cool things at the boutique of the botanical garden and I recognize some of the brands. So it's not just in like a

one off kind of botanical garden collection.

It's like more and more popular that places you can find like wild stuff and like really, I guess like chefs could use this.

Yeah. And since it's still winter in Montreal, we couldn't really do any foraging, so we thought we would find some of the already foraged and prepared interesting herbs and twigs. I was going to say vegetables, but twigs and flowers?

No, I think you can call it a vegetable.

Some vegetables.

Vegetative parts of a plant.

Okay, vegetables. What should we start with?

Okay, so I think we should start with Gourmet Sauvage. This is the company of the Maritime Marinated Spruce Tips. So these are the spring kind of tips that you get from spruce trees that are usually very soft and edible at this point.

Have you ever. Yeah, open it. Have you ever tried spruce tips?

I have. Probably grabbed one off of a tree and just eaten it like that. What's your first impression?

Wait.

Okay, I will say something. And it's. It smells. It kind of smells like cat pee. Like, smell it again.

I don't know cat pee, but definitely dishwasher. Your cat urinated in your dishwasher.

Yeah. You forgot your cat in the dishwasher and you said it to run.

So do you think we'll just eat it raw? Put it on a cracker? I don't want to see it I don't know what it's for. What would you use this for, do you think?

Let's see. If it says, spruce tips are superb and surprising condiments to add to cocktails, sauces, vinaigrettes, tartars, as well as fish.

See it in a sauce. I'm gonna do the influencer thing where I go, you know.

Yeah.

See it. I don't know if that looks good,

but we'll find out. That's a lot.

Is it too.

Oh, yeah. I don't know.

I don't know.

Like, I would put a little.

Just one tip. Just you. Do you try one too? Okay. We're about to try marinated spruce chips.

Cheers.

Cheers. It tastes. How it smells.

You getting, like, a numbing feeling a bit on your tongue? Like a.

Yes, my tongue. So we're not both allergic or.

We are both allergic.

We're both allergic to spruce tips. And this is our death video.

I think it's like the. It's kind of like the. That gum, you know, the. The SAP that kind of comes out. It's, like, sticky. I bet you that's what's kind of creating that. That film on our. On our tongue.

Yeah. Because it's just spruce tips. Water, citric acid, and sea salt. So there's no, like, you know, dill in it or anything like that. I don't think I want to add this to the cocktail. So I don't know. We. We need a rating system. I mean, I'm like, trash or pass. No. I don't know.

Yeah.

What do you think when I leave, what will you do with this jar?

Oh, this is going with you? If this is going.

No, it's already opened. Customs would never let bring an open jar. Shouldn't be refrigerated. No.

I mean, it's preserved in citric acid. She's going back home with it.

I'll be like, oh, no. That. The customs agent took it and threw it.

I could see it going with fish because it has, like, a strong.

Since I don't eat fish. Should we introduce this?

Yeah, let's introduce this. So this is a boreal spruce botanical spring water. So spruce influencer. So spruce beer is actually popular in Quebec. But this is flavored water. So it's sparkling water. It doesn't have anything sweet in it. Because normally when you get, like, a spruce beer here, like, it would be quite sweet, like a soda.

And then to add the sweetness.

So Jeanette got this amaretto, a Quebec amaretto called Avril, and it has a whole bunch of different nuts in it. So I think it said, yeah, forest chestnuts and some other nuts as well as maple. So it's a little bit sweet.

The design also has, like, mushrooms and moths and pine cones and birds, but I don't think those are in.

And I guess when you buy it, it's already almost empty.

Yeah, they have weird laws here. Like, they sell empty chairs or you le. So this is 20, 26% alcohol by volume, more than a wine, less than, like, a hard liquor. If you've had amaretto, you know, let's

cheer so that we can.

Yeah. So we mix these two for our cocktails.

Their palette.

Well, I love the amaretto flavor, and that's kind of the overpowering flavor, I think.

Yeah. And I guess I can't really taste too much of the spruce, but I think it goes, like, nicely because the amaretto is a bit sweet. So it kind of sweetens the sprinkling water.

And, you know, you can always tell if labels match that they all go nicely together, of course. So we won't add any spruce tips to it. All right, so what are we trying next?

You talk about this.

Yeah. I saw this tulip jelly, and I have never eaten a tulip, but I guess people are talking about you can eat tulips.

I have a question.

Yeah.

Is that made with tulip petals or tulip bulbs? Because aren't tulips in the Allium closely related to the allium or the.

Oh, yeah.

So it's like, is that sweet, or is it, like, more of a savory?

I don't know. It just says tulips. Sugar, pectin, sichon. I mean, that's French, so I don't know if it. It doesn't say it in English.

Oh, it's not in English.

Yeah.

Tulip sugar, pectin and lemon.

Lemon sichron.

And we brought some crackers for this.

They would have loved this in the, you know, 18th century Netherlands, probably.

It was, like, sacrilegious to, like, eat the petals. Eat the petals.

Cheer. Cheers. I was expecting a strong floral taste, but I feel like I taste the lemon more than anything.

I taste something floral. Like, I taste something other than lemon. I'm just not sure how I would say it's like, it's very light, almost like it would be a grape jelly. Like a very. Like a white grape leaf.

Yeah, it tastes like a white. White grape jelly, for sure.

It's really mild.

Yeah.

I guess it's more of a novelty

thing, I think so. Especially, like, in the spring, tulip jelly I wonder what it would be like to make it, though, from your own tulips, if it would have a stronger taste or how that would even work out. We have to check if tulip petals are poisonous first. And then for our final fiddleheads.

So fiddleheads are really popular in Quebec. I think they're popular elsewhere, which are the ostrich fern that the head is kind of starting to unfurl. That's when you would harvest it. And actually, they're toxic to eat raw, so you really have to make sure you cook them well.

I didn't.

I'm assuming these are cooked well, and they're actually. They're marinated, so they won't be raw. And it's only the ostrich friend that people harvest.

Oh, okay.

Other ones, I think, have too much of the toxin and they're not good to eat.

This is a little bit like fugu, where we're, like, testing, like, maybe we'll die, maybe we won't.

What is that?

Blowfish.

That's like the.

Because it has toxins in it. But if, like, if the chef prepares it properly, you won't get the toxin, but you'll get a little numbness on your lips. I've never had it, so. I've never had a fiddlehead, to be fair.

Like, I'm not. I'm not really. You want to smell it? Oh, I'm not the biggest fan of fiddleheads anyways. It's really hard to cook them in a way where they're not still, like, tender. Like, kind of a bit al dente, I guess, like an asparagus. You know, like when you overcook an

asparagus is the smell I got was pool, public pool. What do you think?

So the smell that I have is egg. Like an egg albumin. Like the egg whites that are left over on a plate that when you, like, take it out of the dishwasher and it's not properly cleaned, it smells like that. What is that smelling like?

You smell like.

Yeah, but that could just be the preserving of the. Yeah, that has that smell. You can see. Yeah, you can see it kind of unfurling.

Yeah.

I mean, they're cute.

I mean. Yeah, I love ferns, too. Look at ostrich fern. I guess you would grow it if you want to make these.

Yeah, I have some actually growing in my backyard. I've never harvested it.

Cheers.

I like these better than the cooked ones.

Okay. I like it better than the spruce tips.

That doesn't say much.

I've never had them cooked, but, yeah. It had a good crunch. It was more like a pickly. I could see it like on a pickle plate.

I think the texture might be, like. Might be its main use in a dish because it doesn't have, like, a very heavy or a very strong taste.

And I didn't taste the egg. I didn't, like, take that in when I.

Would you go for another one?

I would. And I'm going to read what it says to do with them. Drain and rinse the fiddleheads. That'll get the egg smell out. Add them to salads, stir fry recipes, and whore's divorce.

Shut up. You know what that is, right?

Yeah.

Okay.

You're not getting another one.

No, not after you read that. It had to be rinsed. I'm sorry. Do you want. Are you gonna need another

fun.

Yeah. That was a fun adventure.

Yeah.

And what are these? What are these?

Reduced fat Wheat Thins.

Wow.

Right?

This is traditional American food, right?

Yes, yes, yes.

It grows in the field.

Thank you for coming into Jonathan's greenhouse and getting slutty with us, trying all our KWA treats. And.

Yeah, forget to listen to the podcast. If you like this. If you don't like this, you can still listen to the podcast.

It's funny. Even better than I think we did it.