Contributor : Added by Administrator

Tribal Affiliation : Blue Ridge Mountains Virginia. 3rd great Grandmother was Cherokee

Orgin of Recipe : Offered by Joey Montgomery ... who learned this from Grandmother.. Blue Ridge Mountains Virginia

Type of Dish : All Indigenous Ingredients

Grandmother would have me go get the roots. Would boil dock root first into a tea. Then take this and boil with sassafras root. She would drink this all the time in the Spring for her arthritis. I do know that the dock root tea was for the pain reliever but was bitter by itself and is why she would add the sassafras. She would also add honey to make it better as well.

Note: I do not know the proper name for the dock root. Is what my grandmother called it. It was a weed that grew on our farm in the mountains. She never used the leaves just the root. I also know she would have drank it other times but the Dock Weed was seasonal in the spring...or is when you could easily find it. She swore by it though and complained other times during the year that she wished she had some Dock tea. I do also remember her saying you could not drink to much at one time as it would act like a laxative. One dock root would last her several weeks so it seemed to not be used as a strong tea. she would usually drink in the evening after supper and before bed. I would assume that the Dock weed part was more of a sedative which helped her sleep better rather than actually curing the arthritis.