Root to Bloom: A Modern Guide to Whole Plant Use

Description

Root to Bloom equips readers with the knowledge and tools to grow, eat and celebrate every edible part of the plant (just as the nose-to-tail movement has recast people's understanding and appreciate of meat). The book will explore the lesser-used parts of a plant that are often snubbed in favour of the produce we've come to expect. It includes a comprehensive rundown of 35 edible plants (from coriander to onion to sweet potato), covering extra components of edibility, including flowers, roots and weeds. It educates people about ideal growing conditions, the nutrition level of the parts, as well as activities on how to prepare/preserve them for eating - with recipes (such as Japanese pickled sweet ginger, pickled nasturtium pods, and broccoli leaf coleslaw). As well, it includes six breakout chapters on key related topics: medicinal; herbicides; skin care; weeds/foraging; the orchard; and preserving flowers.

Mat Pember is the founder and creative director of Melbourne's The Little Veggie Patch Co, a business established a decade ago specialising in the design, installation and maintenance of chemical-free vegetable gardens for urban dwellers. As well as writing books (he has co-written six best-selling Little Veggie Patch Co. books), he is a regular contributor to Gourmet Traveller and The Herald Sun. Root to Bloom is his seventh book. After a 15 year career in interior design, Jocelyn Cross took a step back to begin what would become Petite Ingredient, a now leading supplier of organic edible flowers and leaves to the best chefs in Asia and Australia. With a life-long penchant for floristry and passion for cooking and design, growing edible flowers was in retrospect a surprising but obvious career transition. She is now director, general manager, gardener, innovator, researcher and team leader at Petite Ingredient, based in Melbourne's Yarra Valley. Root to Bloom is her first book.