Spring Foraging
What’s in your backyard?
Hiking is a popular pastime activity for local San Diegans. Have you ever noticed all the beautiful wild plants on the trails? Did you know some of them are edible and make beautiful and delicious garnish?
At Snake Oil Cocktail Co., one of our goals is to always use fresh, seasonal produce, and garnishes for our cocktails. We look to the kitchen, local farms, and most recently our very own backyard to find fresh ingredients.
JP, our Cocktail Chef, ventured out to Navajo Trail and found these eight wild herbs native to San Diego:
- Black Sage. History: Native Americans have used it to ease muscle pains.
- Lovage. Uses: Many people get lovage and celery mixed up because they look so similar.
- Black Mustard. Fun Facts: It tastes just like wasabi.
- Lemonade Berry. Quick Recipe: If you take a few seeds and add a little bit of water and sugar you can make lemonade.
- Rosemary. Uses: if you add some sprigs to a hot bath it can help you re-energize after a long day.
- Pineapple Weed. Fun Fact: gets its name from the pineapple smell it produces when you pinch it.
- Coastal Sage. History: In England it was a main ingredient in one of their candies and cough drops.
- Horehound. Fun Fact: Cowboys use to rub it on themselves when they go hunting so that they don’t smell like humans.
We took a few of these local herbs and some Torrey Pine Needles to create a riff on the classic Last Word cocktail. We took part of an Instagram contest that asked participants to create their own version of the cocktail. Check out our recipe below:
1.5 oz Bombay Sapphire
0.5 oz Peachwood Smoked Tart Cherry Puree
0.5 oz Fresh Lime
0.5 oz Agave Nectar
5 Drops Torrey Pine Needle & Fennel Frond Tincture
But before you go foraging on the trails, be sure you know what you are collecting because some of the wild plants might be on the endangered species list or not edible. Make sure you don’t pick off the road because it might be an area that uses pesticides. Also, make sure you aren’t harvesting in a nature reserve because that is illegal.
