The stinging nettle is very popular again today because of its healthy nutrients. With these five recipes you can conjure up delicious dishes from the “weed”.
Nettle recipes – you should know that in advance
There are many reasons to cook more recipes with stinging nettles: The garden herb contains an active ingredient that inhibits the growth of bacteria. Stinging nettles also provide a lot of nutrients: In addition to minerals such as iron, magnesium and potassium, they even contain more vitamin C than citrus fruits!
In order to be able to enjoy the stinging nettle in your mouth without irritation, you must first break off the stinging hairs. For that there are different possibilities:
Briefly boil the nettle. This destroys the plant structure so much that the stinging hairs no longer work.
Roll the collected nettle parts with a rolling pin. This is how you break off the stinging hairs.
Puree or mix your nettle harvest: Here, too, the hair is broken off mechanically.
After you have pre-processed your nettle harvest in this way, you can overcook it without hesitation. Try the following recipes:
Recipe: Nettle as a spinach substitute
Cooked nettle leaves are an excellent substitute for spinach and can be used in the same way.
Ingredients for 4 persons:
500g nettle leaves
1 onion
olive oil
Salt pepper
Preparation:
Remove the stalks (with gloves) from the nettle leaves.
In a covered pot, boil the nettle leaves in a little water for about 10 minutes. It is enough if the water fills the pot by about 1 – 2 cm. Any overlying leaves are cooked by the steam.
Drain the cooking water, but don’t throw it away. It is rich in nutrients and can be used in a soup, for example, or drunk as is.
Finely dice the onion and sweat it in a pan with the oil.
Mix nettle, onion and spices and puree everything.
Tip: The cooked nettle leaves also taste good as “spinach” on pizza or with pasta.
Recipe: nettle pesto
Nettle leaves are also ideal for a tasty, healthy pesto. You can use our basic recipe for homemade pesto as a guide, or try the following recipe idea:
Ingredients for a jar of pesto:
100 ml olive oil
approx. a muesli bowl of nettle leaves
1 large clove of garlic
30 grams of walnuts
20 grams of pine or sunflower seeds
1 dash of balsamic vinegar
juice of half a lemon
1 tsp salt
Black pepper to taste
Preparation:
Briefly roast the nuts and seeds in the pan without fat.
Place the nuts and any other ingredients in a suitable container.
Blend everything with a hand blender until you get the consistency of pesto you want. Alternatively, you can use a mortar and pestle to complete this step. However, this is significantly more time-consuming.
Recipe: Refine the salad with stinging nettles
You can also add nettle leaves raw to any salad. Make sure to break off the stinging hairs first, as explained above. If possible, you should only use young plants or the top leaves of older nettles, especially for the salad. These are particularly tasty.
You can add just a few leaves to your salad or use the nettle leaves as the main ingredient. You can’t go wrong with one of our delicious salad dressing ideas.
Recipe: Nettle Soup
Nettle leaves are also a great side dish for soups. There are practically no limits to your creativity: You can, for example, cook one of our vegan soups and simply add one or two handfuls of nettle leaves.
Nettle soup is often prepared with potatoes and carrots. You can orientate yourself on an ordinary potato soup by adding the nettle leaves about ten minutes before the end.
Recipe: Nettle in a smoothie
Smoothies are popular, versatile and can be really healthy with the right ingredients. So it makes sense to also use the healthy nettle leaves for a delicious green smoothie.
For example, you can use our recipes for green smoothies as a guide – or just get creative yourself. Bananas, strawberries or raspberries, for example, go well with nettles, but also other wild herbs such as dandelion. In any case, a handful of nettle leaves will give you a delicious health boost.
