Once upon a time in the Ozarks we boiled poison tonic in the spring and lived to tell of it.
We called it, arguably the most popular spring tonic in our Ozarks hill culture. I knew from childhood that sassafras root provided the unique flavor for aptly named “root beer,” and like other Ozarks boys I was told the dark red tea brewed by boiling sassafras roots was a healthful tonic, useful in “thinning the blood” in the spring.
I was probably 8 years old when Dad first pointed out sassafras trees along the road near our house and told me the roots could be boiled for tea, and I lost no time in digging some for our housekeeper to boil. Though a tasty tea when sweetened with milk and sugar, I didn’t learn until later that I hadn’t harvested sassafras at all. More likely it was elm or willow.
Shortly after moving to our Dallas County farm a couple of years later I gave it another try. Better informed and better able at 10 years of age to discern the pungent aroma of sassafras, I commenced with an annual ritual this time of year (late February and early March) of boiling pots of sassafras tea. Sometimes the brew would be on the stove for days, staining the pot the color of dried blood, but by the time the flavor in the roots was exhausted I was certain my blood had been adequately thinned for the warmer months ahead. Not only I, but my dad and younger brothers, alike, followed the same regimen for years.
Long after moving from the farm and seeming to leave such hillfolk rituals behind, I still occasionally went out in spring to dig sassafras roots and brew a big pot of tea. My only worry in later years was that the roadside trees might have been tainted by herbicides. I never imagined I could be poisoned by pure sassafras tea.
And as far as I know, I never was.
Medical researchers might differ.
I learned a few years back that sassafras tea contains a poisonous substance called safrole, and one cup of tea contains four times the level considered dangerous. In fact, the Food and Drug Administration banned safrole as a food additive in 1960.
Sassafras flavorings today have the safrole oil removed.
Apparently, traditional Ozarks sassafras tea brewers didn’t get the safrole message for many years. I know we sure didn’t, and I’m confident if my mom had thought the oil pooling atop our pots of red tea was poisonous, we wouldn’t have been drinking it.
On the other hand, she might have known the toxicity tests involved injecting lab rats with safrole oil, and that’s hardly the same as downing a cup of tea.
I won’t be digging sassafras roots this spring. I haven’t for several years. But, taken in the context of all the mixed reviews on coffee, milk, eggs, grilled meats, bacon and hosts of other foods we love, I’m not convinced a cup of traditional spring poison would do me much harm.
But, since I already take an aspirin to thin my blood, it might not do me much good, either.
Copyright 2024, James E. Hamilton; email [email protected]. Read more of his works in Ozarks RFD 2010-2015, available online from Amazon, Barnes & Noble or from the author.
