Purslane
Many of you might recognize this as a weed in your garden (or from our box last year!). This is funny because we used to see this in markets all across Mexico and have learned that it is a common vegetable at the dinner table across the Middle East and Mediterranean! Turns out it’s also super good for you with higher vitamin c, omega 3s, and potassium than most other veggies we eat, so we recommend giving it a good honest try! With its citrusy crunch, purslane is great raw on salads or sandwhiches, cooked in soups, stir frys, verde salsas, or turned into pickles, and more!
Storage
Keep in the fridge in a bag for a week or more. Its crunch makes a pretty tasty pickle as well if you want to go that route to store it!
Our Recipes
Turkish Purslane Salad- Chop purslane into bite size sections, and mix with minced garlic, olive oil, salt, lemon juice, chili flakes, and mint mixed with yogurt. Add garbanzo beans or nuts as a topping!
Purslane with Parmesan - Purslane is the weird viney looking vegetable with small green leaves sticking out. I like to eat it raw because it has a nice citrusy flavor. Some people don't like it raw because of the somewhat slimy texture. Heres a really simple recipe that my mom likes to do: Put water into a sauce pan, wok, or pot, salt it heavily and bring to a boil. Add Purslane and cook until tender, just a couple of minutes. Dump water, heat some butter up in your on high heat and toss in the cooked purslane so it browns slightly. Sprinkle black pepper, salt, and parmesan.
Purslane Verde Salsa- You’ll need an onion cut into quarters, several tomatillos, several cloves of garlic, purslane, peppers to taste, lime juice and cilantro. Heat up a frying pan with no oil, or if you're feeling extra fancy fire up your grill, and place the onions, tomatillos, peppers, purslane and garlic on the hot pan until they char. When all of the ingredients are nicely blackened on the outsides, throw them all into a blender with salt, lime juice, olive oil and cilantro. Blend and continue salting and/or adding lime juice and/or vinegar to taste. You could also add avocado straight in the blender to thicken it or chop up pieces if you want chunks. Use in enchiladas, burritos, on tacos, etc.
Other Recipes
Pickled Purslane: https://www.seriouseats.com/pickled-purslane
Purslane Chimichurri: https://www.fromachefskitchen.com/purslane-chimichurri/
Purslane Pockets: https://plantbasedfolk.com/purslane-pockets-lebanese-bakleh/
Purslane Dip: https://hildaskitchenblog.com/recipe/purslane-recipes/