Wild Cabbage

A guest post from Continuing Studies facilitator, Abe Lloyd.

The name Skunk Cabbage (Lysichiton americanus) will never conjure up epicurean images of greatness but given my recent experiments with the young leaf stalks, I am encouraged enough to emphasize the vegetable epithet and leave out the “skunk.” Throughout our region, the young leaves are just emerging out of saturated soils, standing water, and slow moving streams. Within the next couple weeks, their yellow spathes will unfurl and add color to the wetlands.

I have been curious about the edibility of this plant ever since 1994 when my friend Owen fed me some Skunk Cabbage roots that badly burned my tongue and left me with sores for a week. I learned the hard way that raw Skunk Cabbage is NOT edible. However, Erna Gunther wrote in "Ethnobotany of Western WA" that the Skokomish steamed and ate the young leaves and the Quinault roasted the white part of the [leaf] stalks. The Quileute and Chinook also ate the roots (although I am inclined to believe that the white leaf stalks, which extend through the soil for several inches, may have been mistaken by ethnographers for the roots).

 
Using my hands to scoop away the soft wet muck around the young rosettes of Skunk Cabbage leaves, I was able to follow the emerging shoots 4-6 inches down to the root crown. The shoots that I dug up ranged from about ½ inch to 1 ½ inches in diameter and were as white as a leak stalk.

The roots (bottom) don't look nearly as good as the leaf stalks

I have experimented with both steaming and boiling the leaf stalks and found that boiling does a better job of rendering the stalks harmless. All parts of Skunk Cabbage contain crystals of calcium oxalate called raphide that painfully embed in mucous tissues. Boiling cannot destroy raphides but it may fix the crystals into a starch matrix that prevent the sharp points from damaging our soft tissues. Leslie Haskin wrote in her 1934 publication, “Wild Flowers of the Pacific,” that Native Americans in Western Washington cooked Skunk Cabbage roots with hemlock cambium and it is interesting to speculate if the starchy cambium provided additional substrate for binding raphides. Another matter of speculation is that raphides are most concentrated in the perennial roots and least concentrated in the new leaf growth, which may explain why the young leaf shoots were traditionally eaten. After boiling for about ½ hour in two changes of water, I only noticed a slight tingle on the sides of my tongue. The leaves have a mild flavor and substantial quality that is very similar to cabbage.

While I am still too inexperienced with this plant to give it my full endorsement, I am posting this account with the hope that other people who have eaten our western Skunk Cabbage (which is different from the Easter Skunk Cabbage, Symplocarpus foetidus) will share their impressions with me. If you are curious about experimenting with this plant, BE SURE TO COOK IT, only use the leaf stalks, and try a very small serving to see how you react to it before mixing it with other foods.

Chopped and ready to boil

 

Warning: In some parts of the continent, the deadly poisonous False Green Hellebore (Veratrum viride) also goes by the common name Skunk Cabbage. All parts of this plant are poisonous both raw and cooked.

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Abe Lloyd has a passion for plants and indigenous foods that traces back deep into his childhood. He holds a Master’s Degree in Ethnoecology from University of Victoria and now works as the director of Salal, the Cascadian Food Institute. He is a professor of natural history at Western Washington University, ethnobotany at Whatcom Community College, and instructs courses related to wild foods at RRU. Abe actively researches, promotes, and eats the indigenous foods of this bountiful bioregion. arcadianabe.blogspot.ca   

Join him next month for Wild Edible Foods of Southern Vancouver Island, April 25 and 26. You too might discover the secrets of Skunk Cabbage.

Find out more at cstudies.royalroads.ca.