Good King Henry is a chenopodium....a goosefoot. It's like Fat Hen, and can be eaten the same way.
Both are often considered weeds.....and there in lies the problem. Goosefoots are all edible, but their common names are often used for other plants. It's a muddle. We know what you mean by good king Henry, or fat hen, but when even the latin names are used it muddles.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blitum_bonus-henricus
also known as Chenopodium bonus-henricus
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chenopodium_album
Thing is though, that there's a book in America (where the plants are considered non native weeds) that claims that the plants are poisonous to, "cattle, horses, humans, sheep, swine", so folks believe what's written and just keep posting the information, even when it's wrong
Read the rest of the discussion here,
http://davesgarden.com/guides/pf/go/51560/#b
To be honest, I have eaten both of those goosefoots all my life. I like them
if they grow in the garden I think, "Oh good, dinner
", and I'll forage a bit when out too.
Would I eat platefuls of it day in day out ? well, no, but then it's a seasonal veg to me. I suspect that like feeding rats nothing but McDonalds and when they die reporting that it killed them, a tonne of the stuff a year might rather be a surfeit, but otherwise, it's good food
Bon appetit
M
p.s. While I mind. The leaves are just coming up in from over wintering roots, and those leaves are sort of arrow shaped. The Lords and Ladies leaves are also just coming up, and those too are arrow shaped. They're actually very differently shaped, once you have seen both, just make sure it's GKH you're putting into dinner and not L&L, since the latter is an arum and most definitely
not good for eating.
M
