This is my contribution to this week’s Weekend Herb Blogging hosted by Kelly of Sounding My Barbaric Gulp and I will be talking about ferns.

Ferns are part of a group of plants that are seedless and vascular (most of the vegetables and herbs we know are also vascular but produce seeds). Ferns can be found in a wide variety of habitats – from mountains to desert rock surfaces. The part of the fern that are eaten is called the fiddlehead fern – the unfurled fronds of young fern harvested for consumption. In Tagalog, we call these ferns as “pako”. These are usually sold in small bundles and are quite cheap (~$0.06). These are not cultivated but are picked from the forest so this is not really available all year in the Philippines. We usually have them during the wet seasons (like now).

Ferns have been part of many cuisines. In Indonesia, ferns are combined with a spicy rich coconut sauce called Gulai Pakis. It is eaten as vegetables in Japan and Korea. In North American Cooking, Ostrich fern fiddleheads are part of the traditional dish in New England, Quebec and the Maritimes. And, the Canadian village of Tide Head, New Brunswick is the Fiddlehead Capital of the World! In the Philippines, we usually serve this as a salad.

There was a bunch of ferns sold in the market recently so I decided to serve this with the sweet potato dumplings the last time we had family picnic.

Pako Salad

a bunch of pako
1 small tomatoes chopped
1 small onion, chopped
1 inch knob ginger, crushed then sliced thinly
freshly crushed black pepper
1/2 cup vinegar
1/4 cup fish paste
1 tbsp sugar

Cut the tender parts of the ferns into 2-3 inch pieces. Discard the woody parts. Bring 2-3 cups water to a boil. Blanch fern for 2-3 minutes then Wash ferns in running cold water. Drain. In a bowl, mix fern, tomatoes and onions. In a separate containers, mix the rest of the ingredients then pour over fern. Serve immediately.