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Bear Drummer wrote:
I am trying to find a source for sarsaparilla for us to grow - We are in Southern Mississippi... we love root beer, and my sister has started making teas with what she finds at the herb shops, but we want to grow it, not buy it in bulk... I have searched Burpee's, and done google searches looking for a source... does anyone have ideas on where to obtain some? Sarsaparilla is an extract from the roots of Smilax officinalis. Its use in root beer was for the foam (head) it creates, not for its flavoring. You want either sasparilla (different from sarsaparilla) or sassafras, each of which (or together in combination) have been used to FLAVOR root beer. Sasparilla is extracted from the roots of Aralia nudicaulis, a perennial. Sassafras is extracted from the roots of Sassafras officinale or Sassafras albidum, both of which are trees. Sarsaparilla, sasparilla, and sassafras are all toxic in significant quantities. Thus, care should be taken in how strong you make your root beer and how much you drink in a day. Producers of illegal drugs use safrole and isosafrole, derived from the oil of sassafras root bark, as a precursor in the manufacture of methylenedioxymethamphetamine (known as MDMA, ecstasy, XTC, and Adam). The use of sassafras as a flavoring was banned by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in 1960 after safrole was found to be hepatocarcinogenic (liver-cancer-causing) in the rat. -- David E. Ross Climate: California Mediterranean Sunset Zone: 21 -- interior Santa Monica Mountains with some ocean influence (USDA 10a, very close to Sunset Zone 19) Gardening pages at URL:http://www.rossde.com/garden/ |
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