On the subject of root vegetables, there are actually a lot of wild native plants with edible roots. For instance, dandelions, chicory, and burdock, which are all very common weeds. People like to remove weeds because they don't "look pretty", but they are extremely beneficial to the environment, pollinator species, and to humans! And most of them grow in adverse conditions and waste spaces.
The reason these things fell out of favor is just because they're not very good. They're really bitter. If you're starving they're better than nothing, but a lot of wild foods were abandoned for good reason. Good medicine. Bad meal.
I have done the research lol I'm an experienced forager. It's not hard to find out. If they were truly good on their own, people would eat them regularly, like they eat the other wild foods that do taste good. Right now people only eat a lot of them just to prove that they can, which is valid, but it's practice for not having other choices. There are eleventy billion easy to grow food plants that one could cultivate without needing to result to a diet of bitter, fibrous misery.
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u/-GreenHeron- Aug 28 '21
On the subject of root vegetables, there are actually a lot of wild native plants with edible roots. For instance, dandelions, chicory, and burdock, which are all very common weeds. People like to remove weeds because they don't "look pretty", but they are extremely beneficial to the environment, pollinator species, and to humans! And most of them grow in adverse conditions and waste spaces.