Wild food plants used on the Dubrovnik coast (south-eastern Croatia)

Abstract

Croatia's versatile plant use traditions are still not sufficiently documented. The aim of this study was to record local traditions of wild food plant use on the Dubrovnik coast. We interviewed 40 inhabitants of 23 villages, mainly knowledgeable informants. On average 19 species were listed, which in total produced an inventory of 95 food plant species (including species whose leaves or inflorescences are used as recreational teas).The most commonly collected are: Sonchus oleraceus and S. asper, Asparagus acutifolius, Dioscorea communis, Cichorium intybus, Crepis zacintha, Allium ampeloprasum, Picris echioides and Foeniculum vulgare (all of them used as vegetables), the fruits of Rubus ulmifolius (mainly eaten raw), the fruits of roses (Rosa sempervirens and R. canina) and the leaves of Salvia officinalis (both roses and salvia are used for making recreational teas). A particular feature of the local gastronomy is the collection of young Ruscus aculeatus shoots.

A century of changes in wild food plant use in coastal Croatia: the example of Krk and Poljica

“…The length of the whole list of wild foods (80 and 76) used in the two areas is very similar to those from other parts of coastal Croatia [13,16] and in Herzegovina [15]. For example, in the study from Dubrovnik we recorded 95 wild food species (19 per informant), in southern Herzegovina 82 species (14 per informant) and in the Zadar area 55 species (12 per informant).…”

“…Ruscus aculeatus is rarely used as food. Previously, its gastronomic use was only recorded in Italy [17] and around Dubrovnik in Dalmatia [13]. Interestingly, it is also eaten by an ancient Croatian diaspora in southern Italy [74].…”

“…It is sometimes even said that eating wild greens is a "hidden" part of the Mediterranean diet [11,12]. However, even there this use is declining [10,[12][13][14][15][16][17]. The decrease in the usage of other categories of wild foods in the Mediterranean is probably less profound (e.g., [15,18]).…”

“…Wild food and medicinal plant use in selected areas of Croatia were documented in several studies [13,16,[34][35][36]. All these studies show that the use of wild vegetables in coastal Croatia has been widespread and is to some degree practiced today.…”

Folk food and medicinal botanical knowledge among the last remaining Yörüks of the Balkans

“…Most of the previous studies were mainly aimed at medicinal and edible plants and traditional handicrafts [1][2][3][4][5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15] and shed new light on existing ethnological and anthropological data. Some studies investigated small ethnic groups living in more or less isolated communities and provided new and very important data about the characteristics, storage, and transfer of the region's traditional knowledge [6,[11][12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22].…”