EDIBLE STEMS AND LEAVES 



new leaves should appear, crisp and white and ready 

 for the salad bowl. 



Another old-fashioned pot-herb that may be 

 gathered freely in the spring is the early growth 

 of that familiar weed of gardens and waste places 

 throughout the land, the homely Pigweed {Cheno- 

 podium album, L.), or Lamb's quarters. This 

 latter queer name, by the way, like the plant itself, 

 is a waif from England, and according to Prior ^ is 

 a corruption of "Lammas quarter," an ancient 

 festival in the English calendar with which a kindred 

 plant (Atriplex patula), of identical popular name 

 and usage, had some association. Of equal or per- 

 haps greater vogue are the young spring shoots of 

 the Pokeweed {Phytolacca decandra, L.) boiled in 

 two waters (and in the second with a bit of fat pork) 

 and served with a dash of vinegar. So, too, the 

 first, tender sprouts of the common eastern Milk- 

 weed {Asclepias Syriaca, L.) have garnished country 

 tables in the spring as a cooked vegetable, but the 

 older stems are too acrid and milky for use. Mr. 

 J. M. Bates, writing in "The American Botanist," 

 speaks of this and of the closely related species, A. 

 speciosa, Torr., of the region west of the Mississippi, 

 as the best of all wild greens^ provided they are 



1 "On the Popular Names of British Plants," E. C. A. Prior, M. D. 



119 



