June 4, 2021

Pokeweed.

IMG_5143
Posted by Ann Althouse at 8:26 AM
Tags: ,

10 comments:

Ann Althouse said...

David writes:

Since you often like to look more deeply into things, word etymology for instance. I thought I would pass on some interesting biology of Pokeweed.

“Application
Lectin from Phytolacca americana (pokeweed) has been used:

• as a medium supplement for mononuclear cell incubation, to induce lymphocyte proliferation[2][3]
• as a positive control in the study of the role of chemokine (C–C motif) ligand 2 (CCL2) in proliferation and apoptosis of decidual leukocytes[4]
• as a supplement in the RPMI (Roswell park memorial institute) 1640 medium for peripheral blood lymphocyte cultures[5]."

My employer happens to sell this exact thing.

https://www.sigmaaldrich.com/catalog/product/sigma/l9379?lang=en&region=US&gclid=Cj0KCQjwnueFBhChARIsAPu3YkSmKguZWddPvBrv3dQMCVNZCswYgk_AB7VyBL98LlfrXxpCQTt0JugaApsOEALw_wcB

In case you need some…

6/4/21, 11:02 AM
Ann Althouse said...

By the way, I'm not positive that is pokeweed in the photo. The app Plant Snap identified it as pokeweed — Phytolacca americana.

Wikipedia says:

"Phytolacca americana, also known as American pokeweed, pokeweed, poke sallet, dragonberries is a poisonous, herbaceous perennial plant in the pokeweed family Phytolaccaceae. This pokeweed grows 4 to 10 feet (1.2 to 3.0 m).[3] It has simple leaves on green to red or purplish stems and a large white taproot. The flowers are green to white, followed by berries which ripen through red to purple to almost black which are a food source for songbirds such as gray catbird, northern mockingbird, northern cardinal, and brown thrasher, as well as other birds and some small animals (i.e., to species that are unaffected by its mammalian toxins).

"Pokeweed is native to eastern North America, the Midwest, and the Gulf Coast, with more scattered populations in the far West. It is also naturalized in parts of Europe and Asia. It is considered a pest species by farmers.[4] Pokeweed is poisonous to humans, dogs, and livestock. In early spring, shoots and leaves (not the root) are edible with proper cooking, but they later become deadly, and the berries are also poisonous. It is used as an ornamental in horticulture, and it provokes interest for the variety of its natural products (toxins and other classes), for its ecological role, its historical role in traditional medicine, and for some utility in biomedical research (e.g., in studies of pokeweed mitogen). In the wild, it is easily found growing in pastures, recently cleared areas, and woodland openings, edge habitats such as along fencerows, and in wastelands."

6/4/21, 11:05 AM
Ann Althouse said...

Carilee writes:

I don't know if you and Meade have any intention of eating Pokeweed, but if so you have to be very careful because it is toxic. Apparently it needs to be boiled at least twice. And how could you not mention Tony Joe White's "Polk Salad Annie"?

Down in Louisiana, where the alligators grow so mean
There lived a girl, that I swear to the world
Made the alligators look tame
Polk salad Annie, polk salad Annie
Everybody said it was a shame
Cause her momma was a workin' on the chain gang
(A mean vicious woman)

Everyday for supper time, she'd go down by the truck patch
And pick her a mess of polk salad, and carry it home in a tote sack
Polk salad Annie, the gators got your granny
Everybody says it was a shame
Cause her momma was a workin' on the chain gang
(A wretched, spiteful, straight-razor totin' woman
Lord have Mercy, pick a mess of it)

Her daddy was lazy and no count, claimed he had a bad back
All her brothers was fit for was stealin' watermelons
Out of my truck patch
Polk salad Annie, the gators got your granny
Everybody said it was a shame
Cause her momma was a workin' on the chain gang
(Sock a little polk salad to me, you know I need me a mess of it)

To answer your question -- I did think of the old song but didn't take the time to blog it because I had the feeling I'd blogged it on some other occasion when I'd chanced to photograph pokeweed. Looking now, I don't think I did. It's just that I always think of the song when I see that plant. Don't know if there's any other plant that I feel so strongly connects to one song.

6/4/21, 4:42 PM
Ann Althouse said...

JK writes:

As a kid, I couldn’t understand how my grandmother had developed her taste for poke sallat (poke salad, to me). It’s a weed on the side of the road, that has to be parboiled to keep from poisoning you. But she grew up in near starvation at the southern end of what is now the Smokey Mountain NP in the 1910s. I finally realize that the earliest greens in the Spring were a salvation.

Related, I just watched Jordan Peterson interviewing Yeon Mi Park, a lovely young woman on her life and escape from North Korea, as well as her quite insightful evaluation of Columbia University as a return to the ideological and speech oppression she experienced in NK. At the youtube video named below check out the chapter where she describes ‘Spring: the season of death when people can’t make to the summer for food’ in North Korea. An even more visceral account of conditions that likely made my grandmother find pokeweed a food source. (also the chapter at the end of her time at Columbia University is also interesting)

Tyranny, Slavery and Columbia U | Yeonmi Park | The Jordan B. Peterson Podcast - S4: E26

6/4/21, 4:44 PM
Ann Althouse said...

PatHMV writes:

Here's some more interesting history of why people (particularly in the south) used to eat the poke plant, despite its toxic nature: https://www.saveur.com/poke-sallet/

Apparently, its toxicity helped purge people of worms. Culturally, it's most associated with poor, rural people, and was often one of the first plants to sprout in the spring.

This, of course, was all immortalized in the Tony Joe White song Polk Salad Annie, most memorably performed by Elvis Presley.

6/4/21, 4:46 PM
Ann Althouse said...

Bob Boyd writes:

Now some of y'all never been to Wisconsin
I'm gonna tell you a little bit about this
So that you'll understand what I'm talking about

Down there they have a plant that grows out in the woods and the fields
Looks somethin' like a turnip green
Everybody calls it polk salad, polk salad, huh

Used to click on a girl that lived down there
And she'd go out in the evenings and photograph her a mess of it
Carry it home and post it on her blog
'Cause that's about all she had to post sometimes
But she did all right

Down near U Dub Madison
Where the law professors grow so mean
There lived a girl that I swear to the world
Made the other law professors look tame

Polk salad Annie, polk salad Annie
And everybody said it was a shame
'Cause she closed down her comments section
A means business woman, huh

Poke Salad Annie...

6/4/21, 4:47 PM
Ann Althouse said...

You may notice everyone's bringing up the song... that's because this all came in comments and the comments collected before I posted any of them. Here's another. From Jim:

Pokeweed.

You made me think there's a song titled Polk Salad Annie.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WrT-TQTLoiw

Is it Polk or Poke?
Pokeweed: How to Prepare "Poke Salad" | Wild Abundance

https://www.wildabundance.net › pokeweed
May 27, 2018 — The term “poke salad” is actually a misnomer. Even though that's what a lot of people call the most common pokeweed dish, its true name is poke ... [poke sallet or poke salat]


Reminds me of Judas Priest --
Judas Priest - You've Got Another Thing Comin'

Shouldn't it be You've Got Another Think Comin'?

Oh no. Now I'm going all Althouse!

Thank you and thanks for your blog.

6/4/21, 4:55 PM
Ann Althouse said...

Iain writes:

I showed this to my wife and she doesn't think it's pokeweed. She grew up eating the stuff and doesn't remember red leaves on it: even the newly emerging leaves are green, she says, and I don't think they have serrated edges.

Her family calls it "scoke" or "skoke." I think she was in her thirties before she found out it's poisonous. Her grandmother would pick the young shoots by the roadside and boil them. Of course women of our grandmothers' time used to boil their vegetables till all the nutrition went down the drain with the water and we were left to eat the remaining soft fibrous pale green mush, so maybe the poison was going to the septic tank with the vitamins.

As it grows, the stems thicken and harden and I guess the leaves get too tough or don't taste good. My wife's family never ate from the mature plant, whether because of taste or poison content she doesn't know.

Around here (Connecticut) it flourishes by the side of the road just about everywhere. It's got a pretty serious taproot that makes getting rid of it a challenge. By the time it fruits it will be four or six feet tall. It will have small white flowers that will ripen into very purple berries radiating off fuschia-coloured shafts. The contrast with the dark green leaves is pretty, but I'm not inclined to make a skoke pie for dessert.

6/5/21, 6:44 AM
Ann Althouse said...

Yes, as I said above: I'm not positive that is pokeweed in the photo. It's what the app Plant Snap said.

The picture is getting very close to the newest emerging leaves and the sunlight is doing something special, so this could be something a person familiar with the plant might not have noticed.

6/5/21, 7:08 AM
Ann Althouse said...

Matt writes:

"I know I’m a couple days late, but just read your pokeweed post and agree that’s almost certainly not pokeweed. I put up a few shots of pokeweed growing in my yard here in Kansas... yes, I do eat from these plants; as another commenter mentioned, boiling twice with fresh water is enough to cook out the poison.
https://imgur.com/a/RoZMr3R"

6/6/21, 8:15 PM

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