Stalking the Healthful Herbs by Euell Gibbons

Author:Euell Gibbons
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Stackpole Books
Published: 2019-12-09T00:00:00+00:00

There is a curious belief among my Pennsylvania Dutch neighbors that Queen Anne’s-lace is poisonous, which probably arose from the fact that livestock dislike its aromatic flavor and mostly refuse to eat it. First-year roots, in the fall, are small, tough, and uninviting, but they continue to grow, very slowly, of course, over the winter, and by spring are often as large as your finger and up to six inches long. These overwintered roots are easily located when they send up the first of their tiny, feathery green leaves, and dug at this time they are perfectly edible. Last spring I followed a neighbor as he plowed a field that had been badly infested with wild carrot and selected the largest and finest roots, and got a good supply for my experiments with very little labor.

These roots are easily identified by anyone with a normal nose, for they have exactly the same smell as garden carrots, although they are white instead of yellow or orange. I washed my wild carrots, scraped them, boiled them in just enough water to cover for about 20 minutes, and they became very tender. These were seasoned with salt and butter, and I ate quite a large plate of them with no ill effects whatever. They were quite good, with a distinctly recognizable carrot flavor. They were not as sweet as garden carrots, and of course they lack the yellow carotene that makes the garden carrot such a healthful vegetable. There was a tough woody core at the center of each one of the wild carrots, but these easily slipped out when the carrot was cooked, and the rest of it was pretty good food. I won’t say I preferred them to garden carrots, but they would make an excellent emergency, or survival, food and would be fine to add a carrot flavor and much food value to a camp stew if cultivated carrots were not available.

The roots, the foliage, and the seeds of wild carrots are used in home remedies that come highly recommended by the old herbalists. The feathery first-year foliage is gathered and dried in a warm room, then used to make an infusion, 1 ounce of the herb steeped in 1 pint of boiling water, and taken in wineglassful doses night and morning. This remedy is said to be diuretic, stimulating, and an aid in clearing natural ducts of the body, and is called “an active and valuable remedy in the treatment of dropsy, chronic kidney diseases, and affections of the bladder.” It also “is very useful in gravel and stone, and is good against flatulence,” and “is considered excellent for lithic acid and a gouty disposition.” I’m afraid I know some people who should be given this remedy forcibly. I can only vouch for the fact that it is a warming aromatic drink with a familiar carroty flavor and seems to be harmless in action.

The fleshy roots, boiled until tender, the hard cores removed, and the soft parts mashed and

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