[Sca-cooks] Re: File Seasoning

[Diamond Randall]

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>Sassafras is the bark from the root of a particular tree. If you can't
>find Sassafras root or pure file, then root beer flavoring or
>sarsaparilla extract are a reasonable substitute.

Whoa!  Gag me!  Talk about wrong assumptions, this is a big one.
You don't use file powder as a FLAVOURING in gumbos, so just forget
about root beer or sarsaparilla extracts.  File is used as a THICKENING
agent to give the concoction a kind of slippery, semi-slimey or
viscous texture.  This why you also see okra being used optionally.
Personally, I use lots of both with a nice black roo base.
Living down in the heart of sassafras country all my life, I prefer
sassafras as my tea of choice.  However, some years ago Uncle
Sugar decided that sassafras was hazardous to your health (being
carcinogenic to rats who are fed nothing but sassafras root for several
weeks)and subsequently pulled it from all the grocery produce bins.
The wood of the entire tree is infused with the oils needed to make
tea but the root has the highest concentration of oil, then the bark
next.  The roots have no bark , so you use the entire root, dried or
fresh dug.  It is split into 3" pieces about like the old wooden
cloths pins.  5 or 6 boiled heavily until the water is a deep lake
reddish brown makes a good tea.  The wood can be re boiled
for more tea, but boiled for increasingly long periods.  The split roots
will store practically forever in small rubber banded bundles.
I like both cream and sugar.  It also makes an outstanding iced tea.
However, back to file powder....   It has nothing to do with either
the root or the bark at all.  It is made from the powdered dried
leaves.  I suspect that is more closely related to bay leaves as far
as any flavouring it might add, but laurel will not give the textural
results of file.  I bought a huge institutional container of it at
Robert Orr/ Sysco.  The brand was Durkee.  It was labeled
as sassafras with other (unnamed) seasonings.  I have used it for
years as it does not seem to go soapy like powdered thyme and
smells just as fresh as it was originally.  The leaves do not have the
same oils as the woody parts of the tree, so Uncle Sugar did not
pull file powder from the market.  There is a concentrate of sassafras
tea under the brand name Pappy's which has had the offending chemical
somehow removed, but it is not as good as the real thing.
The sassafras trees grow all over the place here in Tennessee; there is
a fence row of young 10' sassafras just across the lane at Cumberland
Centre.  I wish I could find a really good sized older tree that has just died
to get a good stock of root.  It is so beautiful as a tree, I don't have the
heart to cut down a big live one and the smaller ones don't yield enough
root to be worth digging because the root is a taproot to China!

Akim