Wednesday,
March 26, 2008
Dandelions are an Italian Salad and Wine
Delicacy
The
ANNOTICO Report
Dandelion Wine Remains Popular as Weed
Declines
March 26, 2008
BUENA --
Ada Quarella really was on
to something with her dandelion wine.
It just took a few generations for her family to rediscover it for commercial purposes.
The Quarella family's Bellview Winery now counts dandelion wine among its regular spring wine releases.
"My
great-great-aunt had always made it around the farm," Lee Quarella said recently. "When we were cleaning out the
winery, we found some bottles she had made all the way back to the '50s.
"And they turned out to be really good, so we decided to make it," Quarella said. "At that time, my aunt was still alive. She told us her recipe."
The first vintage of Aunt Ada's formula sold 50 cases, or 600 bottles, two years ago. The business is flowering, mostly from local interest.
The 2007 vintage, which is out this weekend, will have more than 1,200 bottles at $24.99 each.
"It's definitely a niche wine," said Quarella, whose parents, Jim and Nancy, opened the winery in 2000.
The family, vegetable growers for several generations, grows its own dandelions next to the winery. Only the dandelion's yellow petals are used.
"We have 26 different wines we do here," he said. "This one is sort of in memory of Aunt Ada. It's something a lot of local people are looking for, and it's actually fun to do."
While the general population may know dandelion as an annoying and persistent lawn weed, generations of area residents have given it a place of honor on the dinner table.
It is a common ingredient in Italian cuisine in particular.
Farmers start cutting spring dandelions in March. The 2008 harvest has been showing up at restaurants and in private homes as a salad for weeks.
The greater
Dandelion is a shrinking delicacy even here, however. The market started declining around 1990, and the trend continues.
The New Jersey Farm Bureau produce directory
for 2008 lists only eight farms in the state growing it for general sale. Five
of those are in
The Farm Bureau listed 19 growers statewide
as dandelion growers in
Wes Kline, a Cumberland County Extension
Service agent, said dandelions recently were drawing $15 per crate in
Kline said no one tracks how much dandelion
is grown in
"It makes sense to have something to come in early, so you have some money," Kline said. "I think there is more market for what they call 'summer dandelion' than for the true dandelion because you can grow it all through the summer."
One issue for would-be dandelion growers is finding seed. None is sold commercially and fewer growers bother with it. "The person who is selling dandelion is saving their own seeds," Kline said.
"That's not the reason
there is less and less," he added. "The price hasn't been there. It's
essentially an Italian specialty, and that market is getting less and
less."
|
AT A GLANCE |
|
· The dandelion, part of the chicory family, arrived from · About 3 pounds of seed sows an acre. Planting is in the
fall for the spring dandelion. The roots are dug up in the second season
after planting. · The name dandelion comes from the French dente-de-lion,
or lion's tooth, because of its jagged leaves. · The plant has gone by many other names, including
blow-ball, cankerwort, doon-head-clock,
fortune-teller, horse gowan, Irish daisy, yellow gowan and one-o'clock. Source: |
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