Spring Greens

After a long, hard and cold Winter, our ancestors anticipated the first warm days of early Spring and the first “Spring greens” that would begin to appear in the fields and pastures.

The Winter fare consisted of a diet sadly lacking in salad greens. The mainstays of the diet were salt pork, potatoes, heather britches beans, potato onions, turnips, pumpkins, cornmeal and a few root vegetables such as beets, carrots, parsnips, crocks of sauerkraut, pickled beans and corn.

The early Spring greens were often referred to as “salet” and were eaten separately or in combinations. A few of the old favorites were “creasy greens” which were to be found growing in the previous year’s cornfield. Creasy greens are the first cousin of watercress, which is commonly found growing wild in our mountain streams. Dandelions were eaten fresh and considered to be of good “tonic” and medicinal value. Narrow leaf dock was also eaten fresh or as a cooked greens. Wood sorrel, plantain and chickweed were also commonly used.

Every family would have a good lettuce bed growing as early as possible, and the favorite way of eating these greens was a recipe known as “kict salet.” The recipe consisted of a bowl of lettuce leaves and chopped green onions. The dressing was hot bacon grease and vinegar poured over the lettuce and served hot.

Today, we have endless selections of salad greens to choose from the entire year, but for our ancestors, the first “greens” of early Spring were a great gift from nature. 

– John Coykendall, Master Gardener