Hunting Poke Salat
Poke salat is an edible green that folks looked forward to in the Spring, as it was ready to hunt out and cook way before any greens from the garden....Best thing you can do is look it up on the Internet or head for the library to see what it looks like, but one way to find it is to look for big dead stalks that are silvery gray, hollow and may have purple berries on top if the birds left any. New plants come up from the big thick roots - Poison. It's best picked when it's a thick plant about 6 inches tall. It's mildly poisonous so has to be par boiled through one or two waters before finishing cooking it. Depends on how early in the Spring you pick it. I finish cooking it in a skillet with some bacon grease then scramble some eggs in it to kinda cut the twang If you want to know what it tastes like buy a little can of spinach, drain off the water and put it in a skillet with a little bacon grease, stir and cook till any water is gone then scramble in a couple eggs.....THEN you'll
know what Poke salat tastes like.....I pick 8 or more wild greens in the Spring.

It’s about Poke Sallet time
We don't crave green stuffs like our forefathers did after a long winter, but I'm really looking forward to cooking up a big pot of white beans , some corn pone and a mess of Poke salat ....Just in case you are city folks I'll tell you all about this most famous of the wild greens folks have been enjoying down through the years.....Look along fence rows and in new grounds for tall silvery looking dead stalks that have fallen over....there might be fat pinkish looking stalks coming up already. The old stalks may have dried up seed that look a bit like blueberries, only black and smaller.....Just break the growing stalks off at the ground. If it's growing a foot or more tall already just break the top out and it will keep on sprouting side shoots that you can pick later. Some folks just gather it in the Spring, but you can eat it any time it is growing quickly...like where small plants have come up in a burned pile or something....I have eaten it in the Fall , and during the summer as I found new growth, with no bad effects.....

Poke salat is mildly poisonous, so you par boil it through one or two waters before cooking with meat grease.....This also takes away some of that 'whang' that lets you know you're eating Poke salat and not Spinach....Very tender stalks ? I parboil only once....Older leaves and tips later in the season I may do  twice.....I wash the greens and chop them up stalks and all . Some folks just use the leaves.....Keep in mind, it's got a laxative effect on some folks , so eat sparingly the first time......I pour off all the brown tinged water I par boiled it in and then put it in a skillet with some bacon grease...After the waters cooked out I add a couple eggs and scramble it all up ....Sort of like spinach souffle for country folks. You CAN cheat and use canned spinach....Just put the drained greens in a skillet with some meat grease , heat, then scramble in one or two eggs to a small can of spinach....That's the proportion I use.......If you have some Lambs quarters greens to mix in the Poke it would be good, as they are very mild tasting....

Poke berries are also mildly poison, but some folks take a few per day for arthritis.....The root is VERY poison and is only used grated up in  poultices.........I used to lecture on eating Indian food and this is what I remember about it.....Naturally I ate plenty of it growing up and I still hunt it out every Spring ....... and I pick about 8 different wild greens..including violet leaves....No blanching needed on those..

Polk Salat, Mama etc
My Mama had a fairly comfortable growing up period....except for her and Ma's personality clashing ..at least till her much loved Papa got sick. He was about 30 when he and Ma got married, you see. He had a stroke the year Mom was 17 and she had to put in the crop alone except for what help she got from younger sibs. The older kids that might have been some actual help had already married and left or gone off to get public jobs. This backbreaking work made her stronger for when she would be left with a houseful of kids later in life because my handsome blue eyed Daddy died at the age of 34 from Leukemia.

I can remember Mama talking to us about the early years of their marriage....Guess Daddy moved away from his farming family with her and they sharecropped to get a start on buying their own farm. She said his relatives were surprised at the different things she canned for the winter....Polk salat , for one thing. They ate it in the Spring but had
never thought of canning it for the winter months. It was served cooked with meat grease and with eggs scrambled into it....kinda cuts the 'whang.' 'Course it has to be parboiled because there is a mild poison in the leaves. I like to get it when the fat stalks are just up about 6 inches, and cut it up and cook it all...Mama just picked polk salat and 'mouse ear ' but I recognize and pick about 8 edible wild plants....She sometimes mixed the polk with mustard and turnip greens...You have to remember they didn't
have the choices we do now days, and were starved for green things to eat after the long winters diet of soup beans and such..