Alpine strawberries have captivated our taste buds for a very long time. They are tiny yet hugely flavorful ancestors of our common strawberry.
Papalo is a fabulous, unknown, ancient Mexican herb you should be growing. A heat-loving cilantro alternative, its flavors are both bolder and more complex.
Alpine strawberries have captivated our taste buds for a very long time. They are tiny yet highly aromatic and hugely flavorful ancestors of our common strawberry. Archeological excavations have shown Stone Age people in Denmark and Switzerland enjoyed them immensely, as shown from the evidence of seeds in those sites.
What we would recognize as alpine strawberries were first domestically cultivated in ancient Persia, where they were considered delicacies fit only for royalty. As often happens, seeds made their way both east and west through trade along the Silk Road route, becoming widely grown and loved.
The Roman poet Virgil named the strawberry in works about country life, associating it with other wild fruits and citing the beauties of the fields in his third Ecologue. During the same period Ovid mentions the mountain strawberry in his description of the Golden Age in book one and again in book thirteen of his Metamorphoses narrative. Pliny is considered the last of the ancients to write of the strawberry, listing “Fraga”, the strawberry fruit, as one of the natural products of Italy in the twenty first book of his Natural History series.
From the 10th century until the early 19th, alpine strawberries were hugely profitable, highly regarded and very well known. After suffering from some mis-informed bad publicity in the mid-1100s, alpine strawberries became quite popular in religious paintings beginning in the late 1300s – often associated with Mary and the Baby Jesus in illuminated manuscripts and paintings. The Catholic Church and royal families from Italy, France, England and Germany were responsible for much of the promotion of the alpine strawberry as they tasted and fell in love with it.
Madonna among the Strawberries – with the carpet of alpine strawberries
A few excellent examples are located in the School of Cologne in Germany. “The Madonna of the Roses”, “The Garden of Paradise” and the “Madonna among the Strawberries” all portray the Madonna as a young girl in a closed garden with the infant Jesus in her lap. She is surrounded by roses, thistles, carnations, lily of the valley, iris, primrose and the entire plants of the alpine strawberry, showing its tiny, prolific red fruit and white five petal flowers along with its toothy leaves. The alpine strawberries are painted botanically correct and are exact, perfect replicas of what we see today. They are always portrayed in a place of honor and importance, reflecting the standing they held in elevated society of the day.
By the late 1300s the alpine strawberry was in widespread cultivation throughout Europe as more of the working classes began transplanting the alpine strawberry from the woods and wilderness to their gardens. Street vendors were selling the fruit to Londoners in 1430 when John Lidgate wrote the song “London Lickpenny” which mentions ripe strawberries and cherries for sale in London.
All strawberries up until the mid-1700s were all of the alpine or wood type; being very small, highly aromatic and having much more flavor than would be thought possible for their size. These characteristics are what made them so remarkable, along with their intense sweetness. Another interesting fact is not all of these strawberries were red; there were white and yellow varieties which were just as highly regarded as the red ones, having different flavors of their own.
This begin to change with the world exploration of the early 1700s, with plant and animal samples brought back to Europe from all over the world.
The modern domesticated large fruited strawberry got its start from these collecting expeditions, with a few strawberry plants brought back from a mapping trip to Chile by Amédée-François Frézier, a French naval engineer who noticed and enjoyed the tremendously large strawberries growing along the Chilean coast in 1712. He wrote the fruit were commonly as large as a walnut; almost three times the size of the alpine strawberry of the day. He brought back plants which were installed in the royal gardens and in Brittany, which grew well but did not set any fruit. It was later discovered the Chilean strawberries have male and female plants, and Frézier had only brought back female plants.
It wasn’t until 30 years later when someone brought back male strawberry plants from Virginia that the Chilean strawberries began to produce fruit, creating the first hybrid strawberry. This new variety is the foundation of all domestic strawberries grown today with the large and familiar heart-shaped fruit.
As would be expected, alpine strawberries began a decline in popularity as their larger sized and heavier producing cousins gained recognition, both in Europe and America.
Alpine strawberries returned to their former, more exclusive roots, being highly valued by pastry and dessert chefs in France and across Europe for their highly concentrated flavors, balanced sweetness and heady aroma that would perfume a room. Eventually, French and Viennese pastry chefs would raise the use of “Fraises des Bois” to a high art form, competing with each other to make the most visually stunning, aromatic and delicious pastries and desserts possible.
Today, alpine strawberries are almost nonexistent in grocery or specialty stores, but are imported from Europe as ingredients in gourmet jams, sauces, liqueurs and as a coloring agent in cosmetics. The best way to experience these flavors and scents – often described as “ambrosia” – for yourself is to grow them in your garden.
While alpine strawberries may not be as productive in weight as their domestic cousins, what they lack in quantity is more than made up for in quality. Given fertile soil, proper conditions and some care, they can be very productive. Enough so that some caterers, confectioners and resorts are buying from local growers specializing in alpine strawberries.
Besides a good quality, fertile and well-drained soil, alpine strawberries need a good amount of sun. In hot areas, they will benefit from partial or afternoon shade. Consistent soil moisture is a key factor in encouraging production, along with a good layer of mulch along their roots to keep them moist. Another benefit is they readily grow true from seed, unlike domestic strawberries which must be started from vegetative propagation.
They don’t send out runners, instead concentrating their energies in flowering and fruiting. They will slowly increase their crowns and gradually grow into mounds about a foot in both diameter and height. They will often flower the first year, but normally won’t set fruit until the second year and will continue producing for several years if well kept. Because of their growth habits, alpine strawberries make for great border plantings as well as edging along a garden walkway or in larger patio containers. They are perennial and can be very cold tolerant if their crowns are heavily mulched to about eight inches before the first hard freeze.
With a little planning and care in planting and tending your plants, you can experience firsthand why mankind has had such an intense love affair with strawberries for so long. You get to taste the same explosion of flavors and be captivated by those intense aromas which Persian kings and European royalty enjoyed so long ago, right there in your home garden.
Papalo is a fabulous, but still relatively unknown, ancient Mexican herb you should be growing. A heat-loving alternative to cilantro, its flavors are both bolder and more complex. It has been described by some as somewhere between arugula, cilantro and rue; others say it tastes like a mixture of nasturtium flowers, lime, and cilantro. Younger leaves are milder flavored, gaining pungency and complexity as they mature.
Papalo (PAH-pa-low) is known by many names; Quilquiña, Yerba Porosa, Killi, Papaloquelite and broadleaf in English. It is a member of the informal quelites (key-LEE-tays), the semi-wild greens rich in vitamins and nutrients that grow among the fields in central and South America. These green edible plants grow without having to plant them. They sprout with the first rains or field irrigation, often providing a second or third harvest, costing no additional work but giving food and nutrition.
Other quelites include lamb’s quarters, amaranth, quinoa, purslane, epazote and Mache or corn salad.
Papalo pre-dates the introduction of cilantro to Mexico by several thousand years, which is a very interesting story all by itself. South America is thought to be the ancestral home of papalo.
Cilantro is also known as Chinese parsley and was brought to Mexico in the 1500s by Chinese workers in the Spanish silver mines of southern Mexico and South America. Spain had a huge trade industry with China, exchanging silver from America for china, porcelain and various drugs – opium and hashish among them. They also imported many Chinese workers for the silver mines, as European diseases had decimated the native population which had no immunity. The Chinese workers brought along foods, herbs and spices which were familiar to them, so cilantro came to the Americas.
Papalo is sometimes called “summer cilantro” due to its heat-loving character and its delay in bolting and setting seed until late summer or early fall.
The name Papalo originates with the Nahuatl word for butterfly, and Papaloquelite is said to mean butterfly leaf. The flowers provide nectar to feeding butterflies, while also attracting bees and other pollinators to the garden with their pollen.
Part of the aroma and flavor is seen above with the oil glands which look like spots on the underside of the leaves. Those glands produce a fragrance which repels insects from eating its leaves.
There are two different leaf shapes grown – a broadleaf and a more narrow leaf, often called poreleaf. We have found the broadleaf variety to be more palatable, quite a bit more pungent than cilantro but quite tasty. When beginning to use papalo, start with 1/4 to 1/3 as much as the normal amount of cilantro. The flavor is much stronger and lasts longer, so a little goes a long way until you’ve gotten used to it. We grow and offer only the broadleaf variety.
When we hear about people complaining of papalo tasting of soap, detergent or having a rank or funky odor, usually they have encountered the poreleaf or narrow leafed variety. It is quite a bit more pungent than the broadleaf type, so usually comes as quite a shock to our palates.
Papalo seeds look much like dandelion seeds, with the stalk and “umbrella” to help carry them on the wind to their new home. Having the umbrella attached is very important to good seed germination, which we will show you in just a bit.
The harvested seed comes from our grower in a big clear plastic trash bag, as it just isn’t possible to harvest and clean the seeds without breaking the umbrellas off. The seeds are almost weightless, so a big bagful that you can hide behind weighs less than a pound.
Cindy has a handful of seed heads, showing how they clump together after maturing. As the seed matures, the sheath or covering that protects the young seeds peels back, exposing these clusters to the wind, which will carry them away as they dry.
A closer look at the clump of seeds. We haven’t found a better way to separate them without damaging them, so we usually pack them much like this – by the ever so gentle pinch! There are probably 30+ seeds in this photo.
Papalo is often described as having “very low and variable” germination. This is true if the seed is packed in a standard seed packet, which breaks off the umbrella from the stem. From experimenting, we have found germination will drop to around 10% if the seed is broken, but will be as high as 90% or better if the seed is intact.
This photo of papalo in our germination tray shows the proof. Using seed germination paper to keep the seed damp, there was 100% germination in less than 72 hours. In fact, the seedlings hit the lid of the germination chamber, trying to get to the light.
A close-up shows how the stem emerges from the bottom of the stalk, immediately turning vertical in growth, searching for light.
Seen in Cindy’s hand it is easier to identify the parts of the seed and where the seedling emerges from, as well as how tall they can grow in a short time.
We have developed this simple but highly effective packing box from our germination experiments. It keeps the seeds intact for planting as well as protecting them from being broken during shipping.
Young seedlings don’t have the oil glands developed yet, so they are milder in flavor and aroma than when they begin to mature. This planting is a bit thick, but it is sometimes difficult to separate the seeds without damage. In this case, just plant them thick and don’t worry about it. If desired, you can clip the unwanted or unneeded seedlings to thin them. Make sure not to pull them out, as this really disturbs the roots of the adjacent plants and seriously disrupts their growth.
Even in a very harsh spring with sustained high temperatures and punishing winds, the young papalo grows strongly. The weather effects can be seen in the drying of the leaf margins, as well as the scruffy and dry leaf appearance. The holes are not from a bug chewing on the leaves, but from the oil vaporizing from the porous oil glands. The lighter colored spots on the leaves are additional oil glands.
A fully mature papalo leaf in good growing conditions looks like this – a moderately deep, rich green with oil glands distributed across each leaf. The leaves have a medium thickness to them with a fairly substantial feel. They don’t feel delicate like some vegetable leaves, but aren’t thick and succulent either.
Touching them will release some of the aromatic oils, so you should be able to immediately experience their singularly unique aroma, even from an arm’s length away. This is the same with organically grown or home-grown cilantro – the aroma will be much more pronounced.
The seed heads start out looking much like marigold flower heads. After flowering, they will set seed and begin the cycle anew. When harvesting seeds to save, make sure to clip the seed head after it has fully matured and begun to dry but before it is completely dry. Otherwise, you will go out to the garden to collect seeds to find it has all blown away!
In October 1999, when Alice Waters, renowned chef of Chez Panisse in Berkeley, California, first tasted one variety of papaloquelite, she was ecstatic and demanded to know why she had never experienced it before. She purchased every seed packet available from the Underwood Gardens booth at the Taste of the Midwest Festival, an annual event sponsored by the American Institute of Wine and Food.
When we met Alice at Slow Food Terra Madre in Turin, Italy, in 2012, we mentioned this past connection. She immediately remembered the event, and her eyes lit up when we discussed the aromatic flavors and how she introduced them to her restaurant patrons.
It’s always used raw and added at the last minute, giving its signature, unique piquant flavor to dishes. It’s used in fish dishes, salsas and guacamole. There is a memorable guacamole that uses cucumbers and papalo for added depth of flavor that we can’t get enough of. We also really like it in scrambled eggs, fresh salsas, and finely diced in a strongly flavored salad of spinach, arugula, mustard greens, and kale. Devilled eggs take on an entirely new dimension with a couple of leaves finely diced and mixed into the filling. People always try to guess the mystery seasoning and always mistake it for something else.
In restaurants in the state of Puebla in Mexico, it’s common to find a sprig of papalo in a glass jar of water on the table, next to the salt, pepper and salsas — ready to be added raw to soups, tacos, tortas or beans. The diners will take off a leaf or two and tear it up finely before sprinkling it over their meal.
Papalo is very easy to grow and has a history stretching back thousands of years, so give it a try in your herb garden this season!
Alpine Strawberries have a Sweet History
Alpine strawberries have captivated our taste buds for a very long time. They are tiny yet hugely flavorful ancestors of our common strawberry.
Papalo – Heat Loving Cilantro Alternative
Papalo is a fabulous, unknown, ancient Mexican herb you should be growing. A heat-loving cilantro alternative, its flavors are both bolder and more complex.