Mugwort & Friends, Part 1

About Facilitators

Yun Hai 雲海 offers a selection of premium ingredients for Taiwanese and Chinese cooking. We source directly from artisans, farms, and soy sauce breweries in Taiwan. Terrain, technique, history, and humanity come together in the traditional foods we distribute.

Field Meridians is an artist collective committed to strengthening local food ecologies. Through site-specific programming, publishing, and radio broadcast, Field Meridians engages the Crown Heights community to lay the foundations for food sovereignty in the heart of Brooklyn.

The Naval Cemetery Landscape (NCL) is the site of the former Naval Hospital Cemetery at the Brooklyn Navy Yard h as a memorial landscape and a native plant meadow and pollinator habitat, Mugwort will be harvested at the NCL which is fully operated and made open as a public space by Brooklyn Greenway Initiative (BGI) through the generosity of supporters. Stop by and enjoy the NCL’s native pollinator habitat and contemplative memorial urban meadow and learn about the NCL and the Greenway and what goes into maintaining their beauty and accessibility for everyone!

Objective

Mugwort is for dreaming. This rhizomatic, perennial is a persistent and common “weed” found across North America. Called the “mother of herbs,” it is also used across different cultures for medicinal, spiritual and culinary purposes. Join us for a mugwort harvest and plant walk at the Naval Cemetery Landscape (NCL), a public space built and maintained by Brooklyn Greenway Initiative (BGI).

We’ll learn more about mugwort and its ecological considerations from an NCL gardener, receive training to harvest the plant, and then prepare some of it to dry for our June Taiwanese Dragon Boat decoration class, and some to cook and eat on site. 

We’ll be preparing mugwort in a Korean-style savory pajeon pancake.

What's Included

• Ingredients for cooking
• Materials for drying

What to Bring

• Gardening gloves (optional)
• Pruners (optional)
• Pants and long-sleeve shirts for harvesting in the meadow (optional)
• Hat (optional) 
• Water bottle (encouraged! there is no water on site)

Requirements

The Naval Cemetery Landscape is wheelchair accessible. The mugwort harvest will take place in the meadow. Those who wish to participate in the harvest need full range of motion to minimize damage and compaction to the ecology of the landscape.

CURRICULUM

About Mugwort

Artemisia vulgaris (that’s the botanical latin and therefore the international, universal name for the mugwort most commonly found in our area and the one we will be harvesting and using in these workshops) is considered an invasive plant.  Not all plants that are non-native are invasive, and what contributes to meeting the definition of invasive is a tendency to displace so many other species that the plant threatens the biodiversity and ecology of a landscape it has been introduced to. 

About Mugwort in Taiwan

Mugwort has a lot of properties that make it appropriate to Taiwan. For example, it is used at this time of year to ward off insects. These herb sachets have a practical use for human health and wellness. The last time I was in Taiwan was during the Spring and mugwort products abound. People were even messaging me about introducing me to a mugwort farmer! People use mugwort in every day products like toothpaste, tea, insect repellent, food soaks, bath salts, and soap. It is revered as a pharmaceutical and beauty product.