Purple dead-nettle

Purple dead-nettle is the gentlest plant in this collection and the one most often confused with something that stings. It is a mint — square stem, opposite leaves, no sting — and it looks like a nettle only from a distance. The confusion is worth resolving properly, because it also means you can pick it with bare hands in a way you cannot with the real thing.

Dead-nettle versus nettle, without getting stung

The name tells you the important difference: it is dead, meaning it does not sting. It is not a nettle at all — it belongs to Lamiaceae, the mint family, and it is more closely related to rosemary than to stinging nettle. Rub a leaf between your fingers and you get a faint, sweet, slightly resinous smell; there is no sting then and there will not be one later.

Structurally: the stem is square and hollow, the leaves are opposite and arranged in a distinct cross, and the upper leaves and the growing tips are washed with purple or bronze. There are no stinging hairs anywhere on the plant. Nettle has stinging hairs on both leaf surfaces and the stem, and its leaves are alternate, not opposite.

Pick with bare hands and you will know within seconds which one you have. That is a slightly reckless identification method, but the difference is unambiguous and the lesson sticks.

The purple tips, and why they are the crop

The colouring is strongest in the top 6 cm, on the youngest leaves and the growing tips, and that is also where the plant is most tender. Lower down, the stem becomes hollow and fibrous and the leaves go a dull grey-green with a faintly soapy taste. Cut the top 6 cm with scissors and leave the rest.

The tops have a mild, sweet, slightly green flavour that sits somewhere between pea shoots and a very mild mint, and they need no processing at all. They are excellent raw in a sandwich, in a salad, or dropped into a bowl of hot soup at the table where the residual heat wilts them in thirty seconds.

They also make a genuinely good pickle, which is the best way to deal with a large spring surplus: pack the washed tops into a jar with 3 g of salt per 100 g, top with 2.5 % brine, and leave seven days. The purple colour fades to olive but the flavour stays, and the result is a fresh, slightly minty pickle that works on a cheese board.

The flowers, and a note on the bed

The flowers are small, hooded and a clear pink-purple, arranged in whorls around the stem at the top of the plant. They are milder than the leaves and slightly sweet, and they are one of the few wild flowers that are worth picking for a salad in March, when there is nothing else in bloom.

The caution is about location rather than the plant. Purple dead-nettle is a cultivated-ground species, which means it frequently grows in beds that have been fed or sprayed, in the strip along a fence line that has been treated with herbicide, or in the gravel at the edge of a driveway. Take it from hedge bottoms, field edges and unsprayed garden corners rather than from the middle of a productive bed.

It is also a valuable early nectar plant. It is one of the first things a queen bumblebee finds after emerging in March, so leave the largest patches alone and take only from the thin edges.