Wintergreen (Gaultheria procumbens). Here’s a berry appropriate to
end with—one that can be used like an after-dinner mint. The folk names of
this native American plant are many, including: wintergreen, creeping
wintergreen, checkerberry, hillberry, cowberry, nannyberry, teaberry,
mountain tea, Canada tea, ground berry, ground holly, spice berry,
boxberry, and partridge berry. A prostrate evergreen hat grows only 2 to 6
inches high and spreads by means of underground suckers, wintergreen is
hardy everywhere. Gaultheria is named in honor of a Canadian doctor,
Pierre Gaulthier. Though it is commonly grown as an attractive ground
cover, its nutritional value is often overlooked today. The scarlet,
pea-sized berries make good breath-freasheners eaten out of hand, are used
to make liqueur, and in addition to their spicy, aromatic taste, are said
to have tonic properties. The plant’s leaves are a source of wintergreen
oil (now obtained synthetically by most commercial manufacturers) and were
made into a refreshing tea by early settlers, who simply steeped the
leaves in boiling water several minutes. Wintergreen is easy to grow, once
given a partially shaded location and acid soil. It is difficult to
transplant from the wild, however, and it is best to use potted plants or
propagate by cutting a half-ripe wood, the seeds being very small and hard
to handle.
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