The fleshy leaves of this plant are a sure sign that it is wild beets. From it, the beets were domesticated. It's a wild beet. This plant also has the nickname "wild spinach." Today we will make cookies stuffed with beet bar. Leaf structure is a rhombus. The leaf is crisp. The taste is fantastic. Its root is etched white like parsley. The name "spinach" is a misnomer; it comes from a biblical name. Mentioned in the Bib, a plant called tardine has nothing to do with spinach and beets. Root is also edible. Fleshy, shi leaves immediately reveal this plant as a wild beet — the ancient ancestor from which our cultivated beets were domesticated. Over the years, it picked up the mistaken nic"name “wild sp"nach,” though it has nothing to do with spinach at all. Today, it has become the star of our stuffed cookies. Its leaves are rhombus-shaped, crisp, and full of clean, vivid flavour. The root is pale and tapered, reminiscent of parsley, and just as edible. The confusion "with “s"inach” traces back to a biblical term, *tardine*, a name that in fact has no connection to either spinach or beet — slight linguistic detour on a plant with a long, honest lineage.
A walk through the fields with Mr. Barak Sagi in Kfar Yehoshua turns into a quiet masterclass in wild gathering. Our first stop was Iris Ben-Zvi’s organic farm, where the soil itself feels like a guide. Sorrel, Galium aparine, Lamium amplexicaule, wild beet, green arum, Chenopodium murale, and bright, lemony Oxalis — each plant adding its own note to the early-season palette, and all of them reminding how alive the landscape becomes when you know where to look.
