Daisy Fritters

There’s a woman who I spend a lot of time with in the woods who is pretty much an expert at everything. In any case, she’s better than me at most stuff, (ergo, in my mind she’s an expert) so generally if she says something is true, I believe it.

Once upon a time we were picking leaves and ‘frittering them up’ and she pointed out that you could pretty much fritter anything and kids would eat it. So, if she says this is true, then it is.

Which makes frittering daisies a perfectly respectable way to spend a Sunday evening. You’ve got all of the vital bases covered – daisies are easy to identify so no worries about eating something poisonous, daisies love being picked because when you pick them they grow back two-fold, and it’s super-fun to tell your kids that your’re going to take them home and eat them!

I’ve heard from a fairly reliable source that there are not yet daisies in Michigan, so if you’re in Michigan you might need to come back to this in a couple of weeks – but ooooh, is it really still winter in some places?!? If you’re anywhere where spring has sprung you’ll be seeing daisies cropping up all over town.

The little oxeye daisies that we’ve been picking here are super lovely: they’re little bright stars of whiteness against cut green grass during the day and then in the evenings they close up and raise their purple haunches to keep them protected from the cold night air.

Right about now you’ll be wanting a recipe I suspect, and the good news is that you’re going to get two! Because deep fat frying stuff makes it delicious regardless of the batter recipe, you’ll be able to make these no matter how low you are on provisions. (Although I do appreciate that getting a hold of flour has been difficult for some people – so obviously if the only flour you’ve got is kamut flour then use that and let me know if it worked).

If you’ve got all the stuff then mix a cup of flour (self raising would be better but whatever will work), 1 egg, 3/4 cup of milk, 2 Tbsp of sugar and a pinch of salt into a bowl and stir it till you’ve got a slightly runny batter.

If you don’t have any of that, just use a cup of flour, 2 Tbsp sugar, a pinch of salt and a cup of water. (If you don’t have any of these ingredients, then you must be pretty miserable, send me a message, I’ll post you a treat!)

So, get yourself a nice hot pan of oil (don’t ask me what kind – just whatever you have) – drop a little drip of batter in, if it sinks it’s not hot enough, if it floats, you’re good to go. Then all you do is dip your daisies into the batter, they’ll close right up with the weight of the batter, and then drop them in the oil. They’ll brown pretty quickly so get a towel ready to set them on and then start scooping them out with a slotted spoon.

It’s worth pointing out that we have frittered leaves, grass, flowers and everything else edible that we can find and the kids will eat it all. Because it’s deep fried sugary batter.