Chickweed

Although chickweed is diminutive, it is exuberant in its growing habits, taking root throughout much of the planet virtually year-round. “It has been said that there is no part of the world where the Chickweed is not to be found,” wrote Mrs. M. Grieve in A Modern Herbal. She explained its common name thus: “The custom of giving chickweed to birds is a very old one, for Gerard [the 17th-century herbalist] tells us: Tittle birds in cadges (especially Linnets) are refreshed with the lesser Chickweed when they loath their meat.’ ” Alan Davidson notes that “a pleasant old English name for chickweed is ‘hen’s inheritance’ ” (The Oxford Companion to Food).