Picking and Preparing Poke Sallet; Lessons from Nanny

Poke sallet , Phytolacca Americana , a weed that is both feared and eff by many Southerners , was the first wild green I learned harvest . I had been trace mushrooms for year , and had always wanted to forage for eatable plants as well , but I was hesitating to get a line without the help of an experient picker . Well , In the south , if you are blessed with a Nanny or Grandmother in her 80 ’s , you probably have an experient Poke picker to memorise from . You just might hear her call it by a slightly different name : poke salad , polk weed , Virginia poke , or poke bush .

A pair of years ago a remodel forced us out of our home and had us living on the lake just a few minute drive from my Nanny Wilma . It was a great fun time for my small clan , occupy with aliveness lessons including fishing hook removal ( from my flesh ) , gaspergou catching , and poke locoweed pickin ’ ‘ n ’ fixin ’ .

One twenty-four hours I go over to visit with Nanny and found her trimming up a mountain of poking . Like many Southerner , she has cooked lagger sallet with bollock every spring since she was a unseasoned lady . She does n’t even have to go pick it these days , the bag she was houseclean that day had been freshly picked and delivered to her . I was thrilled to see what she was forge on and I was eager to acquire from her . She shared a few tips for finding and identifying poke salade and tell me that she would be felicitous to teach me how to fix it if I go out and picked a batch . I hope to include all of her peak and direction following this story .

Poke Salad on wood

When I left her house that day , I was check every ditch , fence row , and field looking for those beautiful emerald - gullible lance - shaped leaves . The next day I stop on the side of the road in 3 different place to fill my harvesting handbasket with a small mess of greens . I was excited to get to Nanny ’s house that evening to show them to her . My gratifying Nanny was happy to see me and my basketball hoop full of greens … … even though they were not poke sallet . She smile and so sweetly said “ Well , they reckon good enough to eat . But , I ’m not certain what these are . ” I recently pick up that the field goal of leafy vegetable I took her was in fact a field goal of eatable white-livered dockRumex crispus . After a thorough inspection of my basket ’s content , she did find a few cuttings of actual jab sallet . We discussed the differences in the veining , grain and colors of the folio . She explained that the poke plant had light rose - tinted young stems and that the leaves had smoother sharpness than the other greens in the handbasket . Once she explained the differences , the leaves of poke became absolutely recognizable to me . I do n’t retrieve I have walked past a Poke weed since then without spot it … … and poke is everywhere around here !

I went out a few days later and picked an genuine bandage of trailer smoke growing near theHistoric Shelby Iron Works . This time , I really knew what I was picking and I pick a ton of it . If I would have take in how time - take in the provision of poke is , I might have picked one-half as much .

Nanny shared the very basic but important step for safely preparing my jumbo great deal of Poke . I cut , deveined , boiled , labored , boiled , labored and eventually fried up that first huge mountain of poke after about 3 hour of body of work in the kitchen . The result was love , sexual love of a vicious plant that can be turned into out-and-out deliciousness .

poke weed close up

It ’s really expert that I loved it so much , because my first picking of poke sallet was enough to sprout the deep freezer . I have stocked my freezer every leaping since then . But these day I unremarkably limit the size of it of my batches . I do n’t have 3 hours to spend at one time serve poke smoke . The Green River that end up in the freezer have been cooked to the point they are safe to exhaust , and can be used in any way frosty Spinacia oleracea could . We do do it traditional poke and eggs or garget fried in back - fatness . But , I have learned that this various greenish ingredient can be used and appreciated in legion non - traditional way : scoke and artichoke dip , poke and ointment sauce over pasta , poke quiche , poke in smoked chicken chili con carne and my new favorite , the most beautiful immature pasta ever .

The pasta recipe will be my next Emily Post . It was unbelievable and I ca n’t wait to share it .

The culinary possibilities for this ingredient are sempiternal . It is what I always care cooked spinach could be ; a perfect green without any stringy or grainy grain . It is a great way to add a fleck of delicious green to many of our favorite nutrient . I jazz manipulate with this weed .

pasta made from poke sallet

So , why would a plant life with such astonishing culinary note value not be adore by everyone ? unproblematic , people are frightened to death of the stuff . If you do n’t follow the rules for cooking it , poke could kill you or make you so ill you would wish you were dead . Every country nipper in the Dixieland knows that the dark purplish berry growing on the tall marvelous stinky gage with red root word will drink down you ! The total plant is really highly toxic and fulfill with several different active compounds . Poisons … or possibly medicines , I guess that depends on who you require .

Many people including myself believe that poke sallet when decent prepared is actually good for your health . My nanny-goat who is in her late 80s is still die for day-to-day pass , babysitting great - grands and await stunningly beautiful . Maybe she just has great genetics . But , just in case the drone sallet has something to do with her longevity , I will be certain to eat as much of it as possible . The compounds found in Poke are muscular and the plant does merit regard for many reasons . It has been used medicinaly for C and there are several biomedical - enquiry groups looking at poke sallet as a possible treatment for diseases including HIV and Crab .

Poke sallet can be scrumptious and nutritious or toxicant and deadly , depending on how you eat it . The USDA in reality hasPoke Sallet list in it ’s Food Composition Database . I guess that means they accept it as an edible plant , so maybe everyone should get past their fears and learn to decently educate this delicious food .

mature poke weed

This plant has been good to generations of Americans in many ways . The history , cultural signification and many utilisation of this flora are genuinely fascinating . If you know an older someone that eat on poke sens , mind to their tarradiddle and let them teach you about it . There are plenty of people like my Nanny that have subsist rust poke sallet for decades , their cognition is greater than any punch foraging lesson in a book or on a web log . I am grateful for my Poke weed lessons from Nanny and I desire to be teaching youngins about it when I am her age .

I am not an expert phytologist . Please do your own inquiry and know how to right identify and fudge any wild food . Handling poke can be grave and gloves should be worn when picking or handling ( if you are interested or have sensitive cutis ) . If you are pregnant do not handle or consume poke sallet . Keep small fry and pets by from any office of raw jab weed .

Here are a few links that might help you check more about Poke identification .

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