Has anyone actually eaten Mugwort ?

[Toddy]

I was watching a video of a Japanese fellow making rice cakes (we're veggie, Son2 can't eat gluten, I keep an eye out for interesting recipes) and he used Mugwort to make the rice paste that forms the outside of the 'cake'.

Now I use mugwort, but it's a smudge thing. It's a firestarter, it's an insecticidal smoke, it's very good when the blasted midgies descend, but I'd never thought of eating it.
With TeeDee on a culinary crusade to forage his way through the countryside a la cordon verte, I thought I'd ask before I pointed him at the recipe

 

[Broch]

Nope, I haven't - like you I've always assumed its antiseptic and insect repellent properties would make it a bit too 'medicinal'. It's used as an aid to digestion and is reputed to improve appetite. Johnathon Hilton considers it to be very bitter and to use sparingly raw in salad - he also quotes the use by the Japanese in rice.

This, by the way, is one of the many plants advised not to be taken if pregnant because of the thujone content (very low).

 

[Toddy]

I did wonder; Japanese and Chinese sticky rice cake things always leave me a little confused anyway. They're inclined to be a bit like eating too big a bit of Turkish delight, iimmc ?
I think I might give this one a body swerve

 

[EdS]

Tastes like wormwood, unsurprisingly

 

[woodsorrel]

No. I have made smudge sticks with them. It was not known to be consumed by the indigenous peoples of my area of California.

 

[Cornholio]

Mugwort tea is great and it doesn't take a rocket scientist to work it out apart from identification.