Ah, fiddleheads. One of the more mysterious wild spring vegetables. They are the fresh new shoots of a few particular species of ferns, and their cool shape and crunchy, slightly slippery texture and “green” taste make them one of the most sought-after spring wild edibles. This stir fry is my favorite fiddlehead recipe.
This is not a post about identifying fiddleheads, although if you want to find your own, you need to look for fiddleheads from the ostrich fern in the East, Midwest and Canada, and lady fern everywhere else. And remember: Most ferns put up fiddleheads, which are a structure, not a species. You must find the right fiddleheads.
We only have lady fern fiddleheads here in California. They’re OK, but not as good as the Eastern ostrich fern fiddlehead. If you are east of the Great Plains, you can often buy them in farmer’s markets. Sometimes you can see them in ritzy supermarkets like Whole Foods.
Whatever fiddleheads recipe you use, you will want to highlight them. Their season only lasts a few weeks, and you’ll want to savor your fiddleheads while they’re around. (Although you can pickle fiddleheads to eat later in the year.)
I like to add fiddleheads to other springtime dishes, like rabbit with morels and fiddleheads, trout with morels, and added to springy things like ramp pasta or nettle spätzle.
As for my favorite fiddleheads recipe, this Chinese stir fry hits the spot.
It’s all about the fiddleheads, although there’s a healthy amount of shredded pork in there for good measure (vegetarians, sub in mushrooms like morels or shiitakes). It’s light, with no heavy, goopy sauce to hide the flavors of the fiddleheads and other vegetables in the bowl. Serve it with simple steamed rice and you’ll be in business.
I like to add unopened daylily buds to this fiddleheads recipe, because you find them around the same time as fiddleheads, but green beans are a perfectly good substitute.
Fiddleheads Stir Fry with Pork
Ingredients
MARINADE
- 2 teaspoons corn starch
- 1/2 teaspoon soy sauce
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon sugar
- 1 egg white
STIR FRY
- 1 pound pork loin, cut into 1/4-inch matchsticks
- 2 cups vegetable oil, (peanut if possible)
- 2 garlic cloves, sliced thin
- 1/2 to 1 pound fiddleheads
- 1/4 pound daylily buds or green beans
- 1/4 cup ramps, wild onions or scallions, sliced on the diagonal
SAUCE
- 1/4 cup chicken broth
- 2 tablespoons Shaoxing wine or dry sherry
- 1 teaspoon soy sauce
- 1/4 teaspoon white pepper (black is OK, too)
- 1 teaspoon corn starch
Instructions
- Mix all the marinade ingredients together in a bowl, then mix well with the shredded pork, making sure each piece is nicely coated. Set aside at room temperature while you chop the vegetables. Mix all the ingredients for the sauce together in another bowl.
- Heat the oil in a wok or large frying pan to about 275°F -- not too hot. Working with about 1/4 of the pork at a time, fry the meat in the hot oil for 30 to 45 seconds, just to set the coating. Move to a plate and repeat with the rest of the pork. When you're done, remove all but about 3 tablespoons of the oil. (You can strain and reuse the oil 2 or 3 more times.)
- Heat the remaining oil in the wok over very high heat on your hottest burner. When the oil is thinking about smoking, add the fiddleheads. Stir fry them until you get a little char on the edges of the fiddleheads, about 2 or 3 minutes.
- Add the daylily buds or green beans and stir fry another minute. Add the garlic and sliced green onions and stir fry 1 more minute. Finally, stir the sauce well so you get the corn starch (which will have settled to the bottom of the bowl) and pour it into the stir fry. Cook another 30 seconds or so and serve at once.
Wow, I basically independently thought this up on Friday. I found my first fiddleheads ever (I’d always showed up too late in previous seasons) as well as some feral onions and wanted a simple preparation to let them shine. With some of your other stir fry recipes in the back of my head, I basically made up the same recipe. Though I added red peppers and Porcini and served it over black rice.
It was fantastic!