[following your lead, I'm top-posting]

Yes, poke weed is poisonous, but, after some careful preparation, young leaves
apparently can be eaten. Here's an excerpt from a site found via a Google search
for 'poke salat' (http://watersheds.org/nature/poke.htm):

Salat is the German word for salad, and probably came to the Ozarks with German
settlers. Poke salat is made from Pokeweed. In towns you'll find pokeweed growing
wild in alleyways and vacant lots. In the country it grows in the fence rows and along
the edges of woods. When mature it has clusters of shiny purple berries which birds
love to eat.

After a long winter without fresh food, the early settlers looked forward to cooking
the first tender green leaves of pokeweed. It gave them vitamins and was a good
spring tonic. They'd cook it up with lamb's quarters and dock, which are also early
spring greens. Some people today still cook and eat poke greens in the early spring.

Though the whole plant is poisonous, the young leaves can be eaten after cooking
them using two changes of water. Poke is still used medicinally. Old timers in the
Ozarks still eat one pokeberry a year as a preventative or to treat arthritis.

In article ,
says...


Thank you.

teofrasto wrote:
| "Joan F (MI)" ha scritto nel
| messaggio ...
|| A friend in California wants to know what this is, here is what she
|| says about it:
||
|| This plant in the back yard, partial sun, grows about 6 ft high and
|| four across. In front, full sun, about 3 feet. The leaves are pointed
|| lanceolate,
|| the flower and seed pods look like this. Wondering if anyone has an
|| idea what it is?
||
|
| Phytolacca americana, .... poisonous
| bye
| Teofrasto