The Indian cress
Not really a veggie or fruit but I do grow this beautiful plant for it's edibility. The flowers are spicy like peppers and make dishes look beautiful. It's also just a lovely garden plant. You can make it grow upward or let is grow in a pot and it will grow like a hanging plant. Indian cress is very beginner friendly. It can grow in draught and wet soil, small and big plots, with and without a lot of sun. Only seedlings need a little extra care. When it grows seeds, I will collect them for next year and start with a small container. When I just left the seeds on the soil, I found them not willing to germinate.
Carrot
Carrots are fun to grow because most of the magic happens underground. Pulling them out of the soil feels like finding tiny orange treasures.
Potato
Potatoes are one of the easiest crops to grow. You plant one potato and later dig up many more. It almost feels like cheating.
The dandelion
One of my favorite plants. Native throughout most of the world and one of the first providers of nectar in the early spring. Sometimes fields can be found full of them adding this beautiful yellow color blanket on the earth. Nowadays people mostly see the plant as a weed. But did you know this only happened during the 20th century? Before that, dandelions were actually greatly appreciated and even grown. The leaves were used in salads, the roots roasted, the bulbs made into capers, and the flowers fried, baked, dipped into a tea or even turned into honey. Only after the 20th century it has become known as a weed. Plants like dandelion and clover were marketed as 'bad' by the pesticide industries cause their pesticides killed these species. It was one of the most succesfull campaigns in the century known as a 'Smear campaign' or the 'The Greatest Gardening Scam'. Check out my picknick page for a recipe with dandelions!
Forget-me-nots
I love the story of forget-me-nots. It goes as follows: A knight and his lover were walking along a creek. It saw beautiful little blue flowers just by the edge of the water and decided to pick some. But then the knight lost it's footing and fell in the swampy creek. Just before he was lost below, he threw the bouquet at his lover and said "forget me not!". There's also a version of this story where the flower said "forget me not" to god, when he seemed to be done with making everything on earth. Besides the stories forget-me-nots have figured out a very different way of spreading it's seeds. It makes a sweet substance around the seeds which is favoured by ants. They take them from the flowers and spread them around and in their burrows, where it may grow a new plant.
silverweed
Beautiful silver looking leafs with yellow flowers that remind me a bit of strawberries. Big chance it's also native in your place cause it's native in the whole of the Northern hemisphere. It grows low on the ground so I really like it as a soil cover. And though I haven't tried it yet, it can be used in tea against any menstrual cramps. The roots supposedly taste like parsnip. Both native-Americans and Tibetans ate it. There is a simple recipe of the plant on Wikipedia saying they cooked it in butter and sugar.
Marigold
Marigolds come in a couple of variaties. All orange leaves and green stems but some with so many leaves, it looks a bit like a dandelion, others more widespread like the image, giving a daisy look like the one on the left. I keep marigolds mostly for it's medicinal properties as well as it's slug slug repellent abilities. The young shoots are loved by slugs but the grown adults give a, too slugs, nasty smell. Making them perfect for natural borders around your veggies and fruits. I also use marigolds in tea and as a salve. Marigolds are known for it's antibacterial and calming properties making it a soothing cream for wounds, eczema, the digestive system and menstrual cramps. I will give a recipe for this later on my website.