Lamb's Quarters

Chenopodium album · also: wild spinach, fat hen, goosefoot, chénopode blanc

ripe nowGreens🗓 Spring through fall📍 2 on map

How to ID it

Diamond / goosefoot-shaped leaves, often with a slightly toothed edge.
The diagnostic: a white, powdery, water-repellent coating on the newest growth and leaf undersides — rub the growing tip and it feels mealy, and water beads on it.
Stems often striped with pink/magenta; can grow knee- to head-high in disturbed soil.

Safety

One of the safest wild greens — a close relative of quinoa and spinach, with no dangerous lookalike. Confirm the tell-tale white mealy coating on the newest leaves.
Like spinach it holds oxalates and can take up nitrates: cook it rather than eating big raw quantities daily, and skip plants from sprayed or roadside soil.

Arguably the best wild green on the continent, growing as a “weed” in every garden bed, vacant lot, and sidewalk edge. If you learn one urban green, learn this one.

Harvest

Pick the tender top 10–15 cm and young leaves; strip leaves from tougher lower stems.
It regrows after cutting, so a good patch keeps producing all season.
Later in the season it sets abundant seeds — edible, a wild relative of quinoa, worth collecting if you’re keen.

Prep

Cook exactly like spinach: sauté with garlic and oil, wilt into soups, eggs, dal, or pasta. It holds texture better than spinach.
Young leaves are fine raw in small amounts, but cooking is the default (reduces oxalates, tastes better).

Notes

(Best patches, and when they bolt to seed.)