Photo: Dietrich, David Nathanael Friedrich, Public domain (via Wikimedia Commons)
Mexican Sarsaparilla
Smilax medica
Also known as Sarsaparilla, Zarzaparrilla, Mexican sarsa
Key benefits
✦Traditional uses
✦Long before it flavored frontier sodas, sarsaparilla root was a staple of Mexican and Central American herbal medicine, dug from the shaded understory and simmered into decoctions for skin complaints and general debility. Spanish physicians carried the root back across the Atlantic in the sixteenth century, where it became one of the most sought-after New World remedies, prized as a tonic to cleanse the blood and ease aching joints. By the nineteenth century it had found its way into apothecary shelves throughout Europe and America, brewed into spring tonics meant to shake off the sluggishness of winter. It later lent its name and flavor to the sarsaparilla sodas of the American West, though most of those drinks leaned more on sassafras and birch than on the root itself.
How to grow & use it
✦The full apothecary for Mexican Sarsaparilla
Traditional remedies and step-by-step preparations, a complete growing guide, and how to harvest, dry, and store it, all unlocked with HerbLens Unlimited.
- ✦Remedies & preparations
- ✦ Growing guide
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- ✦Burdock root
- ✦Sassafras
- ✦Ginger
- ✦Wild sarsaparilla (Aralia nudicaulis)
- ✦Burdock root
“For the old apothecary's root, dug from shaded forest soil and simmered into the tonics that once lined every frontier drugstore shelf.”
The old-fashioned sarsaparilla sodas of the American frontier owe their name to this root, though most bottlers of the era actually flavored their brew with sassafras and birch, using true sarsaparilla more for its reputation as a tonic than for its taste.
Sarsaparilla root contains saponins that can cause stomach upset or kidney irritation in large amounts, so traditional preparations use it sparingly. It may increase the absorption of certain drugs, including digoxin, so use caution alongside medication.