A common weed in Wellington suburbs is Acanthus mollis, Bear's Breeches.
There seem to be absolutely no references* old or new to it being used for food despite being well known in Europe for thousands of years at least, noted as the inspiration for Ancient Greek ornament.
However I've found if the immature flowers are removed, the top few inches of the flower stem is quite edible. It is bland in flavor and crunchy raw, when boiled it is rather floppy but tastes good, like mild asparagus. It is not produced in great quantity compared with the size of the plant. The flower stem further down, surrounded by prickly mature flowers, is very slimy and tough once mature. When immature the peeled core of the inflorescence stem is pretty good to eat, if slightly mucilaginous.
I also sampled the peeled core of the leaf stem base raw. It is white, produced in reasonable quantity, bland in flavor with a very slight bitter aftertaste, crunchy, and without fibers. It is a bit like water chestnut (Eleocharis dulcis), could potentially be used the same way I'd say. I've not tried cooking it yet.
I could find no reference to it being toxic but it probably should be treated with some caution as there seem to be no ethnobotanical or historical references to it being used as food at all, not even as famine food. It has however been consumed for medicinal purposes ( https://pfaf.org/user/Plant.aspx?LatinName=Acanthus+mollis ).
*Since writing this a few months ago I've noticed Alejandra Robles has reported using the roots and stems as food but considers this experimental. (West Coast Food Forestry. 2005.)
https://www.academia.edu/34135104/West_Coast_Food_Forestry?email_work_card=view-paper
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