Free Wild Spring Plant Foods: The Foxfire Americana Library (7) by Edited by Foxfire Students Page B

roots and tender limbs in March. Boil roots and limbs and sweeten with sugar to taste. Or wash roots, beat to a pulp with a hammer. Boil, strain, sweeten, and drink with ice. Or put one cup shredded bark in quart of boiling water. Boil ten to twelveminutes, strain, sweeten with honey or sugar. Or use one five-inch piece of sassafras root one inch thick. Shave into two quarts water; boil, adding sugar or honey. “Mighty tasty if stirred with a spicewood stick.”

    I LLUSTRATION 2 Harley Carpenter with strips of sassafras bark for tea.
    Sassafras candy: grate bark, boil, strain, and pour into boiling sugar; then let harden and break into small pieces.
    Sassafras jelly: boil two cups strong sassafras tea and one package powdered pectin. Add three cups strained honey. Strain and put in jars. Jelly will thicken slowly.
    The leaves of red sassafras make a good addition to candy and icings. Add one teaspoonful of dried and pulverized leaves to a kettle of soup, or add one teaspoon of leaves to a warmed-up stew.
    Spicebush
(Lindera benzoin)
(family
Lauraceae
)
(spicewood, feverbush, wild allspice, benjamin bush)
    I LLUSTRATION 3 Spicebush
    Spicebush is a shrub growing six to sixteen feet high in rich woods, ravine-covered forests, or on damp stream-sides. It has smooth green stems and twigs, with a strong camphor-like smell. The leaves are medium green, paler below, and fall early in autumn. Honey-yellow flowers appear before the leaves in very early spring. In fall, the bush bears bright red, or (rarely) yellow, aromatic berries.
    Twigs and bark are used for tea. Berries can be used as a spice in cooking. Spicebush is gathered in March when the bark slips. Mrs. Norton told us, “You’ve heard tell of spicewood, haven’t you? Well, it grows on the branches [streams] and you get it, wash it, and break it up in little pieces. It tastes better than sassafras; it ain’t so strong.”
    Spicewood tea: “Get the twigs in spring and break ’em up and boil ’em and sweeten. A lot of people like that with cracklin’ bread” (Mrs. Hershel Keener). Or gather a bundle of spicewood twigs. Cover with water in boiler. Boil fifteen to twenty minutes (or until water has become colored). Strain, sweeten with honey, if desired, or add milk and sugar after boiling. Especially good with fresh pork.
    Spicewood seasoning: gather spicewood berries; dry and put in peppermill for seasoning.
    Sweet Birch
(Betula lenta)
(family
Corylaceae
)
(black birch, cherry birch)

    I LLUSTRATION 4 Sweet birch
    The sweet birch is a common tree in the deciduous forests of the mountains, growing to ninety feet in rich ravines, along with tulip poplar and red maple. Bark on young trees is a red-brown, but becomes very crackled on old trees. The slender twigs smell like wintergreen. Catkins appear before the leaves in very early spring. Leaves are oval, tooth-edged, and deep green in color. Small seeds are eaten by many species of birds.
    Buds and twigs are favored “nibblers” for hikers in the mountains, and will allay thirst. Twigs and root bark are used for tea, and trees are tapped so sap can be used for sugar or birch beer. At one time, the sweet birch provided oil for much of the wintergreen flavoring used for candy, gum, and medicine. The inner bark is an emergency food if you are lost in the woods, for it is rich in starch and sugar.
    Sweet birch bark tastes quite good, and may easily be peeled off to chew like chewing gum.
    Sweet birch tea: cover a handful of young twigs with water; boil and strain. Sweeten with sugar or honey. The birch is naturally sweet so needs very little extra sweetening. Good hot or cold. Or bore a hole half-inch thick into tree. Insert a topper or hollow toke of bark; hang a bucket under end of toke to collect sap. Drink plain, hot or cold.
    Birch beer: Tap trees when sap is rising. Jug sap and throw in a handful of shelled corn. Nature finishes the job.
    Morel
(Morchella esculenta, M. crassipes, M. angusticeps
)
(sponge mushroom,