Dr. John Nelson

Each week The Columbia Star features an explanation and picture of a

mystery plant given by Dr. John Nelson, the curator of the USC Herbarium. To learn more about the Herbarium, call him at 777-8196. His department also offers free plant identification. www.herbarium.org

One nice thing about being a botanist is that there is always something to talk about at the dinner table, unless you are a total carnivore. This week’s edible Mystery Plant fits the bill quite nicely, and offers another slant on the wonderful sunflower family.

Rattle–box, Crotalaria spectabilis Of course, you will know this is the cultivated artichoke, or globe artichoke as it is sometimes called. Artichokes have been prized by humans as a food source since the time of the ancient Greeks, and the ancestors of the modern species are from the Mediterranean area. The origin of the name artichoke is a bit difficult to pin down, but most likely comes from the Italian articiocco , or possibly from the Arabic al–qarshuf.

Introduced into America in the 1800s by Italian immigrants, artichokes are now a huge crop, centered in California. The town of Castroville, CA, has proclaimed itself the “artichoke capital of the world,” and perhaps with good reason, as most of the artichokes you see in markets come from there. As you might expect, the Castrovillians have developed their own artichoke festival; the next one takes place in May.

It turns out that in the late 1940s Marilyn Monroe broke onto the scene as Castroville’s first artichoke queen. For more information, visit their web site at www.artichoke-festival.org.

An artichoke is basically the unopened flower head of a special thistle. As a member of the sunflower family, the tiny flowers are located deep inside the head (or capitulum), tightly surrounded by green, stiff, spiny bracts. The blooming plants are beautiful, with several hundred tiny purple flowers arising from the opened head…but of course you have to eat these things long before the flowers are visible.

After steaming or boiling, and cooling, it is the bracts that are pulled off one by one, dipped in butter or lemon juice, and then the inner surface scraped across your teeth. When you get all the way to the interior of the head, the fibrous flowers are scraped away, and then the exquisite artichoke heart is ready to eat. Delightful stuff, but labor intensive. Something like eating a lobster.

Answer to last week’s mystery plant

Photo by John Nelson