Inadvertent Hippie The riveting tale of converting my front lawn to an edible garden (and other epic adventures)

I am really excited for the Friends School Plant Sale.  Honestly, until today I had no idea who “Friends School” was and why they sell plants, but I’ve definitely known of this sale is The Event for gardeners in the Twin Cities.  Over 2,300 different kinds of plants are for sale over 3 days at the state fairgrounds.

Photo from the U.S. Botanic Garden via the Wikimedia Commons

With a little research on Teh Googles, I found out that “Friends School” is an actual place and, notably, one that an Inadvertent-Hippie-Such-as-Myself is happy to support.  As such, in public I’ll probably pretend the reason that I’ve signed up to volunteer at the sale is because of my deep, sincere goodness. However, my five blog readers will know the truth: I want to get into the pre-sale and the deeply discounted closing sale. Who knows, maybe the elusive Corpse Flower will be available for $0.50 and bloom before the next century.  Maybe 10 fruit trees will strike my fancy for a 15′ x 15′ urban garden orchard for my back yard (sorry, honey, we’re going to have to move the new grill…and the garage…).  It’s just too early to say.  All I know is that I’ll be there and ready for action.

This year, the plant sale is well aware of people’s interest in perennial edibles and have a lot of them!!  Score. This is what they say:

Here’s a list of the perennial edibles in our catalog. Some are in vegetables, but ­others can be found in herbs, fruit, perennials or native wild flowers.

• Fruit—The entire section, from Apples to Strawberries
• Herbs—Many are perennial, but I’ll mention Chives, Horseradish, Lovage, Mint, Egyptian Walking Onion, Winter Savory, Sorrel, and Spikenard
• Native Wild Flowers—Dwarf Red Blackberry, Ostrich Fern (as fiddleheads), Nodding and Prairie Onions,
• Prickly Pear, Giant Solomon’s Seal
• Perennials—Daylilies, Dwarf Cattails, White-Flowered Arrowhead, Wild Hyacinth
• Trees—Chokecherry, Korean Pine, Basswood
• Vegetables—Asparagus, Rhubarb, Scallions, Black Salsify (Scorzonera), Sunchokes

Before eating any of these plants, we recommend that you do some research to see which parts are tasty and whether cooking is needed.

Some of the plants we would like to get, but did not have a source for this year:

• Good King Henry, Chenopodium bonus-henricus
• Jinenjo Yam, Dioscorea japonica
• Multiplier onion, Allium cepa aggregatum
• Ramps*, Allium triccocum
• Water Celery, Oenanthe javanic
• Water Lotus, Nelumbo nucifera

Also, Angela Graney- who, now that I’ve discovered her, is a hero of mine – is leading a workshop at the sale to Build a Cold Frame for $26.00.  She converted her lawn in NE Minneapolis to an urban farm!