Pot liquor

Pot liquor
Boiling collard greens
Alternative namespotlikker, collard liquor
TypeSoup
Place of originUnited States
Region or stateSouthern United States
Main ingredientsLiquid from boiling greens (collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens); sometimes salt, smoked pork or smoked turkey

Pot liquor, sometimes spelled potlikker or pot likker, is the liquid that is left behind after boiling greens (collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens) or beans. It is sometimes seasoned with salt and pepper, smoked pork or smoked turkey. Pot liquor contains high amounts of essential vitamins and minerals including iron, vitamin A and vitamin C.

In the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, the term pot liquor is used to describe the broth left over from boiling multiple vegetables (potato, carrot, cabbage, etc.), usually with the dish known as Jiggs Dinner.

Background

The consumption of potlikker was common among enslaved people in the United States to concentrate nutrients from vegetables. Most people crumble cornpone (corn meal mixed with a little salt and water, made into a patty and baked until it is hard) into the potlikker.

Southern Culture

In 1935, governor and U.S. senator Huey Pierce Long, Jr., of Louisiana presented a treatise on potlikker during a 15-hour filibuster. In his autobiography, Every Man a King, he defined "potlikker", a favorite of his country political supporters, as

... the juice that remains in a pot after greens or other vegetables are boiled with proper seasoning. The best seasoning is a piece of salt fat pork, commonly referred to as "dry salt meat" or "side meat". If a pot be partly filled with well-cleaned turnip greens and turnips (which should be cut up), with a half-pound piece of the salt pork and then with water and boiled until the greens and turnips are cooked reasonably tender, then the juice remaining in the pot is the delicious, invigorating, soul-and-body sustaining potlikker ... which should be taken as any other soup and the greens eaten as any other food...

Earlier, in 1931, Long's insistence on dunking his cornpone in the potlikker stimulated wide debate on whether crumbling or dunking was the correct method of immersion, with comments made by Emily Post and New York City mayor Jimmy Walker. Long's pro-dunking stance met with uniform opposition from other governors including Benjamin M. Miller of Alabama, John Garland Pollard of Virginia, and William H. Murray of Oklahoma. The governor of New York state, Franklin D. Roosevelt, wrote a letter to the "Potlikker and Cornpone Editor of The Atlanta Constitution," endorsing crumbling.

Former governor and U.S. senator Zell Miller of Georgia wrote a defense of the traditional spelling "potlikker" in a letter to The New York Times.

See also

References

  1. 1 2 "Pot Liquor or Potlikker?". The New York Times. 23 February 1982. Retrieved 9 April 2011.
  2. ↑ Covey, Herbert C.; Dwight Eisnach (2009). What the slaves ate: recollections of African American foods and foodways from the slave narratives. Santa Barbara, CA: Greenwood Press. p. 78. ISBN 978-0-313-37497-5.
  3. ↑ "Pot Liquor (Likker)". Florida Heritage Foods Project. Santa Fe College. Retrieved 26 December 2025.
  4. ↑ Bower, Anne (2007). African American Foodways Explorations of History & Culture. University of Illinois Press. p. 48. ISBN 9780252031854.
  5. ↑ Edge, John T. (ed.). "Greens". The New Encyclopedia of Southern Culture.
  6. ↑ "Huey Long Filibusters New Deal Legislation". United States Senate. Archived from the original on 4 February 2026.
  7. ↑ Huey Pierce Long, Jr., Every Man a King: The Autobiography of Huey P. Long (New Orleans: National Book Club, Inc., 1933), pp. 200-201.
  8. ↑ "Emily Post Rules on Potlikker Etiquette; 'Dunk With Dunkers, Crumble With Others'". The New York Times. 1931-02-19. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.
  9. ↑ Times, Special to The New York (1931-02-23). "CRUMBLING VS. DUNKING IS PUT UP TO WALKER; Atlanta, Seeking Mayor's Decision on Momentous Southern Issue, Sends Cornpone and Potlikker". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.
  10. ↑ "MAYOR RECEIVES CORNPONE; Potlikker Comes With It for Test of Their Merits". The New York Times. 1931-02-25. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.
  11. ↑ "MORE GOVERNORS JOIN POTLIKKER DISPUTE; None Agree With Huey Long That Corn Pone Should Be Dunked, Not Crumbled". The New York Times. 1931-02-18. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.
  12. ↑ Times, Special to The New York (1931-02-26). "Roosevelt Makes Cornpone a 1932 Issue, Though He Prefers It Crumbled in Potlicker". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.
  13. ↑ Times, Special to The New York (1931-02-27). "Georgia Acclaims Roosevelt For Crumbling His Cornpone". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.
  14. ↑ Correspondence, Julian Harris Editorial; Times, the New York (1931-03-01). "CORNPONE DUNKERS LOSE IN ARGUMENT; Advocates of Crumbling Were in Majority, According to Georgia Newspaper. EDITOR TELLS INSIDE STORY Atlanta Constitution Started the Potlikker Discussion to Revive Our Sense of Humor. Crumblers the Victors. Hygienic Humor". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2026-10-29.