Native American Foods: Technology and Food Sources: Vegetables

In addition to starchy root vegetables, seasonal leafy vegetables were common. The season often began with a spring tonic from the onion family, among the Cherokee a dish of ramps, or wild leek (Allium tricoccum), and progressed to other spring and summer greens. Examples of the greens most widely used are mustard, cabbage, turnip (genus Brassica and Pediomelum esculentum), amaranth, purslane, lamb’s-quarter (Chenopodium), nettles and nightshades (genus Solanum), wood sorrel, and watercress (Rorippa nasturtium-aquaticum). The immature seed pods of some plants, among them milkweed (genus Asclepias), were steamed or boiled and then served as vegetables.