Greater Stitchwort and Chickweed

I spotted these flowers growing on the margins of a farm field yesterday. At first I thought it was Chickweed - a common edible. But a closer look revealed it to be Greater Stitchwort (Rabelera holostea). But that's okay as it's also an edible plant.

You can easily distinguish Stitchwort - also known as Addersmeat, Wedding Cakes, Shirt Buttons or Star of Bethlehem - as it has five white bifurcated petals and the petals are deeply grooved. The centre of the flower is yellow. The stem is brittle and squarish and the leaves are sort-of greyish-green and pointed and sit opposite each other in pairs on the stem.

It tastes something like lettuce and something like grass and gets its name from the fact that it was an old folk remedy for stitch - that ache you get in your side when walking or running.

Chickweed (Stellaria media) does look similar from a distance - it has the same pattern of five bifurcated flowers. However, they are much smaller and have no deep grooves. Plus, they don't have those yellow centres that Greater Stitchwort has. And the leaves of Chickweed are much bigger.

Chickweed - also known as Starweed, Chickenwort, Craches, Maruns, Winterweed and, confusingly, Common Stitchwort, is a tasty substitute for lettuce in summer salads (and tastier than Greater Stitchwort). Pick the tender top young leaves as they can get stringy as they get older. The flowers are edible too.

It can grow in quite dense patches and has one very distinguishing feature - the roundish stem has a line of hairs on just one side, like a Mohican hairstyle. 

Greater Stitchwort and Chickweed are so similar that, for a very long time, they were classified as related members of the Stellaria. Many websites still show Greater Stitchwort as Stellaria holostea. However, it was transferred to the genus Rabelera in 2019 based on phylogenetic analyses. It is the only species in the genus Rabelera identified to date.