Poke Sallet

I got a taste of local Appalachian (please say that with all short vowels thankyouverymuch) culture yesterday that I have never had before and I wanted to share it here.  My mother in law (Granny to everyone around these parts) had come over and excitedly pointed out all the pokeweed growing in our horse field.  She took us to the field and she picked 3 trash bags full and talked about how good poke sallet is.  I begged her to let me know when she cooked some so that I could come and taste this strange weed that she was harvesting from my field.


She boiled the leaves for "a long time" (she never specified how long) and then she put some of them in a pot and fried them with eggs.  I refused to look at how much oil she used to fry.  It was actually very good.  All 5 of my kids had two servings.  The taste kind of reminded me of a very mild spinach.  


After eating it (I meant to do it before I ate it, but I guess trusted Granny enough to eat first and ask questions later), I Googled what in the world I had eaten.  There is actually a lot to be read about the pokeweed.  It is a delicacy to a lot of people apparently.  Also, I learned that the pokeberries that will grow on it later in the season were used years ago to make ink for pens and are often called inkberries.  I hope to figure out how and have some fun with that with the kids this summer.  


Here are some of the links that I found:


Poke-Sallet, Mother Earth News (this one has lots of information that I have not quite read completely yet)


Poke Sallet By Any Other Name, Suite 101


Finally, I am curious to know from my family if this is something that my family ever ate too.