I’m a chicken when it comes to foraging, but I am genuinely interested in trying some of the edible wild plants that I’ve been learning about. I am working up my courage to try them while I expand my knowledge about them. When I read recently that goldenrod flowers and leaves can be made into a decent herbal tea, I decided to investigate further, because goldenrods are flowers with which I have some familiarity. I feel safer with them than I do with other plants that I’ve only recently identified.
There’s also a fun and historical story behind goldenrod tea. After the Boston Tea Party, colonists starting making “Liberty Tea,” which was the name they gave to various teas concocted from local plants, including goldenrod. Liberty Tea was even exported to other countries.
There is some disagreement about which goldenrods are good for tea-making. It seems to depend on what you want from the tea. If you want good flavor, sweet goldenrod is the best, and perhaps only, way to go. Most of my edible-plant guides mention that variety and that variety alone. Sweet goldenrod is said to have an anise-like flavor, which might not be everybody’s “cup of tea.” I have had anise tea, though, and liked it, so it stands to reason that I’d like sweet goldenrod tea, too.
Online sources are less discriminating about the type of goldenrod used, and for the so-called “medicinal properties,” then perhaps any variety would do. In The Neighborhood Forager, author Robert K. Henderson states, “Where sweet goldenrod is unavailable, the less aromatic flowering tops of other tall species can be used. Canada goldenrod (S. canadensis), western goldenrod (S. occidentalis), smooth goldenrod (S. gigantea), tall goldenrod (S. altissima), or fragrant, white-flowering silverrod (S. nemoralis) can all be infused. Few have sweet goldenrod’s flavor, however, so they are more useful for medicinal than beverage tea.” Goldenrod is said to be a diuretic, which sounds believable to me. As for other health claims made by herbalists, I am skeptical.
If I were to use goldenrod for tea, it would be for the flavor (foraging is one thing, and alternative medicine is quite another). Obviously, to make a good-tasting cup of tea you need something aromatic. So, as a quick and easy first step, the other day I picked a bunch of goldenrod leaves (well, leaves of plants that I was pretty sure were goldenrods–none of them have bloomed yet). I tore the leaves and gave them a sniff. Some of them had no discernible scent. Others were grassy with an unpleasant hint of something menthol-like. They didn’t seem like good tea-making leaves to me.
I was a little disappointed, but it’s early for goldenrods. There are many varieties, some of which don’t bloom until fall, and I won’t be able to identify them until they’re blooming. Maybe I’ll find some tea-worthy types later in the season. I will search for them, even if that means making a spectacle of myself. I suspect that I already look crazy to passers-by as I stop to take pictures of every other thing along the side of whatever path I’m on, and no doubt I will look crazier yet picking and sniffing at random leaves, but it will be fun. Expect to see more goldenrod posts as the year progresses.