8 kinds of "sprouts" you must eat in spring, if you miss them you will have to wait another year!

Everything grows in spring, and all kinds of fresh seasonal vegetables have also emerged. There is an old saying: "Eat sprouts in spring and melons in summer." Today, we will take stock of all kinds of delicious "sprouts" in spring. Buy them home and taste them to replenish your body with some spring energy~

01. Toona sinensis

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Toona sinensis, in the Encyclopedia of Chinese Cookery, Toona buds are divided into green buds and red buds. Green buds are green, good quality and strong fragrance, while red buds are reddish brown, coarse quality and poor fragrance. As far as I can remember, when I was a child, all the Toona sinensis on the market were green buds, and red buds only appeared later.

Chinese toon must be eaten fresh. Once it wilts, its fragrance is basically lost by more than half, and it is not very tasty. Before eating Chinese toon, you must first "brew" it, that is, use boiling water to scald the Chinese toon and then cover it with a lid for a few seconds. After that, drain the water. The toon will turn into emerald green and its fragrance will be fully stimulated. This is how it tastes.

There are many ways to eat Chinese toon. The most common ones are Chinese toon scrambled eggs, Chinese toon noodles, Chinese toon fish, Chinese toon beans, etc.

02. Pepper sprouts

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The young shoots of the Chinese prickly ash tree (Zanthoxylum bungeanum) are also delicious. They are called "pepper core" in Beijing. The tenderest shoots of pepper core are picked, coated with a thin layer of batter, and fried in oil. They are very delicious. It is said that Empress Dowager Cixi especially liked to eat them.

Pepper cores can also be eaten as "noodle toppings", especially when eaten with lamb broth as a topping for noodles. Wash the pepper cores, cut them into sections, and sprinkle them into the soup while it is hot. The heat from the soup can fully bring out the aroma of the pepper cores, and the taste is far better than freshly fried pepper oil.

03. Elm Seeds

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The fruit of the elm tree (Ulmus pumila) is called "elm seeds" in Beijing dialect. You can eat elm seeds in March and April every year. When eating elm seeds, you must eat tender ones. They must be newly grown and still green. Otherwise, they will be old and not tasty.

The most common way to eat elm seeds is to mix them with "two kinds of flour" (half white flour and half corn flour), mix the washed elm seeds with the flour, and steam them. Steamed elm seeds will taste authentic only when they are steamed with two kinds of flour. If only white flour or corn flour is used, the taste will be much worse. After steaming, dip it in soy sauce or pepper oil, and it will taste delicious. Although it was used by poor people to replace food during the lean period, the taste is not bad at all.

04. Shepherd’s Purse

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It is a common wild vegetable all over the country. The ancient Chinese have a history of picking shepherd's purse, which can be traced back to the Spring and Autumn Period and the Warring States Period. The famous poet Xin Qiji's famous line: "The peaches and plums in the city are worried about the wind and rain, and the spring is in the shepherd's purse flowers at the head of the stream" is a description of shepherd's purse. Su Shi also has a poem: "Sometimes I go around the wheat fields to look for wild shepherd's purse, and force myself to cook mountain soup for the monks." In Sichuan, people still call shepherd's purse porridge "Dongpo Soup".

There are many ways to eat shepherd's purse. Northerners like to chop it up, mix it with meat filling, and make buns, dumplings, and pies. A bite of the fragrance of shepherd's purse mixed with the aroma of pork is so delicious that you can't stop eating it.

05. Sand Allium

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Sand onion, also known as Mongolian leek (Allium mongolicum), is a common wild vegetable in the northwest region. It was previously used as forage, but later people found that sand onion tasted very delicious when pickled with salt, so they began to eat it.

The sand onions that have just sprouted in spring are the freshest and tenderest, and have the best taste. There are many ways to eat them, such as scrambled eggs, used as bun and dumpling fillings, stir-fried with meat, and pickled. The freshest way to eat them is as a cold dish, which is also very simple to prepare. Pick fresh and tender sand onions, wash them, put them in a pot, blanch them in water, take them out, and just add some salt.

06. Water celery

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Water celery (Oenanthe javanica), also known as wild celery and water celery, has tender stems and leaves that can be eaten as vegetables. Fresh water celery has a light fragrance. It can usually be washed and blanched and then mixed with soy sauce, salt, sugar, MSG, oyster sauce and other seasonings and served cold. It can also be cooked by stir-frying, mincing garlic, or stir-frying with meat slices.

07. Malan

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Malan (Aster indicus) tastes slightly bitter. Usually, the young leaves are washed and blanched in boiling water to remove the bitterness, then chopped and mixed with dried tofu, sesame oil, soy sauce, salt, monosodium glutamate, sugar, balsamic vinegar and other seasonings for cold dishes. Yuan Mei of the Qing Dynasty recorded in Suiyuan Food List that bamboo shoots and chopped Malan are mixed together and poured with balsamic vinegar. It is a good dish to relieve greasiness. In addition, it is very delicious when made into small buns with meat fillings.

08. Purslane

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Purslane (Portulaca oleracea) is a wild vegetable widely distributed in my country. Generally, its stems lie flat on the ground, with multiple branches and alternate leaves. The oval green leaves are slightly blunt at the tip and usually have small yellow flowers. Both the stems and leaves of Portulaca oleracea can be eaten as wild vegetables. They are good for blanching, stir-frying, and making soup. They can also be used as stuffing.

We need to remind everyone that although there are many kinds of young sprouts of wild vegetables that can be seen in urban green spaces, gardens or suburban fields, it is not recommended that you pick them and take them home to taste. This is because some plants look very similar to these edible wild vegetables, but are poisonous in their bodies and difficult for ordinary people to identify. Picking them home and eating them may cause food poisoning.

Moreover, even if the wild vegetables you pick are edible, some parks or green spaces will spray pesticides regularly to control pests and diseases. If the wild vegetables you pick are contaminated by pesticides and you eat them without washing them thoroughly when you get home, it will also cause food poisoning. In some rural fields, manure is released, and the wild vegetables nearby may be contaminated by manure containing parasite eggs, posing a risk of parasitic infection after use.

Many places have specially planted some wild vegetables and sold them in the market. If you want to try them in spring, it is recommended that you buy them in the market. It is best not to eat wild vegetables picked by yourself.

Author: Erzhu Popular Science Creator

Review丨Gu Yourong Associate Professor, School of Life Sciences, Capital Normal University