How to Harvest Wild Fennel

Wild fennel is delicious, but is so prominent across most of this country that it's considered by some to be a weed. Like dandelion greens, it can be delicious when harvested and treated by specific culinary means. Luckily, if you're a fan of wild fennel, it's easy to find, easy to harvest, easy to prepare---and easy to enjoy. If you're willing to do a little foraging, the intense taste of wild fennel can soon be yours.

Things You'll Need

• Sharp pocketknife
• Bag or bucket to carry your fennel
• Pen and paper

Instructions

1. Identify the wild fennel. Like commercial fennel found in grocery stores, wild fennel has long, green, celery-like stalks with feathery green fronds growing from them. It also smells very strongly like anise, or licorice. However, one major difference between commercial and wild fennel is that wild fennel has a more intense flavor. Another difference is that it often does not have a bulb---instead, you cook and eat the stalks, unlike with commercial fennel.

2. Write down where you've found the wild fennel. If it's public land, feel free to cut it and take some away for your own personal use. If it's on someone's private property, politely ask if they'd mind if you harvest some of their fennel. Since it's widely regarded as a weed, some homeowners might even thank you for taking it away. The worst that can happen is that they'll say no.

3. Cut the fennel stalks off at their bases. Smaller ones will be more tender, as a rule; larger ones will likely be more woody and tough. Do not attempt to eat fennel stalks that have already gone to seed, as they won't taste as nice.

Tips & Warnings

• Be careful of pesticides and other unwanted chemicals that may have affected the wild fennel you're thinking of harvesting. In forest preserves and other public land areas, it's possible that local municipalities have hired professional pest controllers to come spray all the plants on a given patch of land. If you can find someone to ask, you might do well to ask whether this has been done to your potential dinner. Also be careful of wild fennel harvested from areas that are popular places with local dog owners.

• Wild fennel is very popular in Italian cuisine, and Sicilian cuisine specifically. Apart from the fact that the stalks and fronds of wild fennel are consumed rather than the bulbs, another important difference between wild and commercial fennel is that wild fennel is almost never consumed raw. Rather, it's used as an herb and cooked with other foods to accentuate their flavors as such. Do not use wild fennel raw in salads as you might with commercial fennel.

References

• About Fennel Types: Growing and Harvesting
• Finding Wild Fennel