While taking a walk in the neighborhood, a weedy-looking plant caught my eye. It had nubbly, deep red fruit all along the stems and was quite dramatic by contrast with the tattered-looking leaves. The gardener said it was leafy goosefoot. What can you tell me about it?
Leafy goosefoot refers to Chenopodium foliosum (or its synonym Blitum virgatum, as well as a related species, Blitum capitatum). Another common name is ‘strawberry blite,’ not to be confused with blight of any kind, but derived from the genus name Blitum. The leaves do resemble the footprint of a goose. Those nubbly strawberry-like fruits that are produced from summer to early autumn are edible, with a mildly sweet flavor or–according to a 1794 issue of Curtis’s Botanical Magazine–“in their taste they have nothing to recommend them, though not pleasant they are harmless.” The leaves are also edible and similar in both appearance and flavor to spinach, which is why another name for the plant is ‘strawberry spinach.’ It has value as a beneficial plant for wildlife, and it has a history of being used to make dye and ink.
Strawberry blite is a wild and weedy plant that can tolerate harsh conditions, as demonstrated by its ability to grow in landscapes ravaged by wildfire.