Wild Fennel has edible stems, leaves, flowers, seeds, and pollen. The gathered pollen fetches high prices overseas. You can try the roots too for flavouring, but they're a bit tough to eat.
Fennel has a natural affinity with dairy in both sweet and savoury dishes. (Fennel and white chocolate sauce on ice-cream, mmmm.)
The fennel 'roots' or 'bulbs' you buy in stores are really the fleshy base of the stalks - from a variety of fennel, Florence fennel, specially bred for this purpose.
If you're eating wild fennel stalks, choose the younger, tender ones. You may still want to strip away the outer layer if it's a bit stringy - just try and see.
Medicinally fennel is particularly useful for digestion, and is most famous as a carminative, getting rid of wind. It's at least partly the anethol which does it; the same compound that gives fennel its aniseedy flavour. Anise, star anise, and licorice all contain anethol too.
Fennel essential oil is used in aromatherapy and perfumery, and is one of the few essential oils grown and processed here in New Zealand.
A few useful links:
A recipe for candied Angelica stalks which you can use for fennel stalks just as well
101 ways to make cream of fennel soup
Above photo of fennel courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.
