Birch Bark Tea

[conanjaguar]

I had always been wanting to try this…, and I finally did today . Here’s the rundown:

First off, you need to find a birch tree. You can recognize them by their peeling outer bark and narrow, serrated, pointed, oval-shaped leaves.

The biggest giveaway, though, is the fragrant pinkish inner bark. That is want you want, not the outer scrappy stuff. I harvested my bark from a live, mature birch tree since that has the best aroma and flavor (in my opinion), but if you don’t want to kill a tree, than find one that’s already dead, I guess…

Anyway, you will want to use a knife to peel off this pinkish-whitish inner bark. Chopping won’t be necessary, because it will come off in shreds.

Steep the bark in hot water for approximately 10 minutes, you will know when it’s done by the reddish color.

Enjoy! It doesn’t taste very strong, but I suspect I didn’t have enough bark for the water I had. It’s not bad, tastes a bit like wintergreen and sour apple mixed with persimmon, and puckers the mouth slightly. It does leave a residue on the bottom of the cup that needs to be rinsed out, however.

Birch bark is supposedly a powerful pain reliever, antibiotic, and is high in Vitamin C, along with many other benefits, but I take all that with a grain of salt .

Edited August 5, 2023 by conanjaguar
Leaves

[J.W.P]

cool