Cunningham's Encyclopedia of Wicca in the Kitchen (9 page)

Energies:
Peace, healing

Lore:
Fresh cucumbers were once placed under swooning women's noses (remember swooning?). The odor was supposed to rouse them from their faint.

In Africa, the Nuer sometimes consecrate a small wild cucumber and sacrifice it in place of a treasured ox during important ceremonies.
29

Magical uses:
Add cucumbers to peace-inducing diets. Peel and munch on one of these raw, whole fruits for quick relief from stress. Or, eat cucumbers while recovering from illness to speed the healing process. Visualize as you eat.

Eggplant

(Solanum melogena
var.
esculentum)

Planet:
Jupiter

Element:
Earth

Energies:
Spirituality, money

Magical uses:
These natives of China were originally small, egg-shaped and white, unlike our massive purple specimens. Eat cooked eggplants to increase spirituality. If you're fine in this department, visualize increased money while dining on the vegetable.

Many people dislike the strong taste of eggplant. If you happen to be one of them, you'll be happy to hear that you don't even have to eat this purplish food to benefit from its energies. To manifest additional money in your life, split an eggplant into two equal pieces. Place a one-dollar bill between the pieces, tie them together, bury them in the earth, and never dig them up. Money will come to you (but you'll be out a buck).

Endive

(Cichorium endivia)

Planet
: Jupiter

Element:
Air

Energies:
Physical strength, sex

Magical uses:
Endive is overlooked today as a salad green. This is a shame, because it can be eaten to promote physical strength (and is certainly safer than steroids).

Endive is another of the many foods that are thought to create sexual desire. Who am I to argue with long-standing tradition?

Greens

In general:
Greens are linked with fairies in Scotland and Ireland. This may be one reason why green has long been thought to be an unlucky color. Additionally, greens were once rarely found at wedding feasts and receptions for the same reason—the celebrants didn't wish to offend the little people.
35

In folk magic, greens of all kinds are eaten for money.

Leek

(Alliurn
spp.)

Planet:
Mars

Element:
Fire

Energies:
Protection, physical strength

Lore:
Leeks are steeped in myth and folklore. In twelfth-century Persia they were worn over the left ear to prevent intoxication. Gerarde, who lived in sixteenth-century England, thought they produced nightmares. In his time, a leek was hidden inside a black cloth and placed under the pillow of an ill person to effect a cure.
56
Leeks were also regarded as solemn protection against fire and lightning.

Magical uses:
Leeks are good protectants, as you might expect from a member of the onion family. Make leek soup or add leeks to a stew for this purpose.

Additionally, they can be eaten for increased physical strength. According to tradition, Welsh soldiers rubbed fresh leeks on their bodies for success and vigor in battle. They also believed that the magic juice would protect them from wounds. The leek is still a national symbol of Wales.
114

Lettuce

(Lactuca sativa)

Planet:
Moon

Element:
Water

Energies:
Peace, money, celibacy

Lore:
Lettuce was sacred to the god Min in ancient Egypt. Min, whose graphic depictions as a phallic god were deemed obscene a hundred years ago, also ruled over vegetation of all kinds.
23

Lettuce seems to have been his favorite due to its greenness and the fact that the core, when squeezed, exudes a milky sap that was probably associated with semen. Lettuce was naturally related to the act of procreation and to fertility. It was commonly stocked in tombs and offered to Min.
23

At least one Roman emperor was so enamored with this vegetable's restorative properties that he had an altar, complete with a statue, built to the plant.
15

Magical uses:
A Mexican woman once told me that when her young children were “crybabyish” or hyperactive, she'd simply put them in a bathtub with lettuce leaves. This calmed them.

Wild lettuce contains opiates and the juice was once drunk to bring on natural sleep. Today, lettuce is eaten with visualization for peace and tranquillity, even though the common head lettuce found in grocery stores contains virtually no opiates.

Like other salad greens, lettuce is added to money-attracting diets. Use in a salad with fresh dill weed for increased money.

Lettuce is also eaten (in direct contrast to most other foods) to cool sexual desire and, curiously enough, to prevent seasickness.

Mushroom

Planet:
Moon

Element:
Earth

Energies:
Psychic awareness

Lore:
Pharaohs in ancient Egypt ate mushrooms, but the common people did not. Romans believed that mushrooms provided strength to the body.
53

Mushrooms, like all fungi, have long been regarded with suspicion. Their seemingly miraculous appearance overnight after a good rain, their mysterious ways of propagation, and their eerie appearance have put them into a thousand magical spellbooks and fairy tales.

Some mushrooms are delicious and quite safe to eat. Others are delicious and quite deadly. Accidental deaths still occur each year when amateur mushroom hunters pick the wrong kind of wild mushrooms to enjoy in natural meals.

Mushrooms containing hallucinogenic substances have been used for ritual purposes in Mexico, South America, Siberia, and in many other parts of the world.
123
They remain a popular (and illegal) street drug in parts of the United States.

Magical uses:
Add normal culinary mushrooms to meals to heighten psychic awareness.

Olive

(Olea europaea)

Planet:
Sun

Element:
Air

Energies:
Spirituality, health, peace, sex

Lore:
The olive was sacred to Aten in ancient Egypt.
69
Olive oil, which was in great demand in the ancient world, actually led to the downfall of Greece. Farmers began growing olives almost exclusively while ignoring food crops. This began Greece's dependence on imported foods. When import lines were cut, Greece and its populace suffered.
104

Oil was used in hundreds of ways in the ancient world, but it was always linked with religion. It was necessary for the creation of the scented oils used in both religious and magical rituals. In Greece, olive oil was the most popular ingredient for these purposes.

The Romans disdained the use of butter in cooking. They moistened bread with olive oil (as we use butter) and also cooked food in oil.
104

Magical uses:
Add olives or olive oil to spirituality inducing diets. Olives are perfect for post-ritual feasts.

Small amounts of olive oil can be added to health diets. Visualize!

Olives are also eaten for peace and for the release of stress. If this isn't a problem, olives (and the oil) are suitable for arousing sexual desire.

Onion

(Allium cepa)

Planet:
Mars

Element:
Fire

Energies:
Protection, weight loss

Lore:
The great city of Chicago was named for the local Indians' word for the wild onions growing in the area—
chicago.
56

According to ancient Egyptian incantations, onions were included in charms designed to keep potentially harmful ghosts from children.
23
Celebrants at winter solstice festivals in Egypt wore onions around their necks.
23
Onions also played a role in the mummification process.
69
Though it has often been written that the pyramids were built by onion- and garlic-fed slaves, all Egyptians ate onions in those days. Onions, bread, and beer made up the basic ancient Egyptian diet.
104

In old Rome, the naturalist Pliny wrote that runners should eat onions daily for speed and endurance.
86
About 1394, an Arab writer recommended onions boiled together with green peas and spiced with cardamom, cinnamon, and ginger to create sexual desire.
56

Three hundred years later, the English herbalist Gerarde prescribed the use of onions in weight-loss diets; their low caloric content makes them ideal for this. Even if they are well boiled, he states, onions will not lose their “attenuating” quality.
36

In contemporary Guatemala, men eat onions to retain virility and to procreate children, even into advanced age.

Magical uses:
This sharply scented plant has long been revered and utilized in magical ritual. In general, onions are eaten to boost our protective armor, which is created by a flow of energy from the body. They can be used in any form whatsoever for this purpose; the sharper the taste, the more effective the onion will be. Onions have long been kept in the kitchen, halved, to absorb evil.

Or, as Gerarde recommended, eat onions daily as part of a weight-loss plan.

Pea

(Psium sativum)

Planet:
Venus

Element:
Water

Energies:
Love

Lore:
During the Inquisition, peas were thought to be standard food for “Witches.” They have always been sacred to the Mother Goddess.

Magical uses:
Cook peas with basil, coriander, dill, or marjoram. Cook while visualizing this simple food as a powerful love attractant. Then eat.

Poke

(Phytolacca americana)

Planet:
Mars

Element:
Fire

Energies:
Protection

Magical uses:
All parts of this Native American plant are poisonous, save for the young shoots. These are cooked and eaten for protection.

Potato

(Solanum tuberosum)

Planet:
Moon

Element:
Earth

Energies:
Protection, compassion

Lore:
The potato is a native of Peru, where it was first cultivated by about 34000
b.c.e
.
104
It was introduced to Spain (and subsequently throughout Europe) in 1534.
120
It was immediately claimed that the potato was a sure-fire cure for impotency. At times, it was sold for the equivalent of 1,000 dollars a pound.
104

Potatoes lost favor in 1728 in Scotland, where cultivation of the potato was prohibited because it was an
unholy
nightshade that wasn't mentioned in the Bible.
120

Practitioners of American folk medicine carried potatoes in their pockets to cure rheumatism.
44
In England, toothache sufferers carried a piece of potato to vanquish the pain (this was probably most effective while going to see a dentist).
35
Those who dine on new potatoes are granted a wish.
68

Magical uses:
As with many root crops, potatoes are added to protective diets. They should be seasoned with onions, chives, dill weed, rosemary, or parsley for the strongest effect.

Additionally, owing to this vegetable's lunar rulership, potatoes can be eaten to instill compassion.

Pumpkin

(Curcurbita
spp.)

Planet:
Moon

Element:
Earth

Energies:
Healing, money

Lore:
According to early American lore, if half a pumpkin is left exposed in the kitchen, negative energies will arrive to spoil the cooking.
22

The pumpkins carved with faces and lit with candles on the last night of October in the United States are related to the similarly prepared turnips carried by children in the U.K. They are created to scare away evil.

Pumpkins are sometimes featured in Samhain celebrations by Wiccans as symbols of the fruitfulness of the earth and of the God's death beneath the sickle of time. These round, orange vegetables are also symbols of the Mother Goddess.

Magical uses:
Add pumpkin dishes to health diets. Dry, roast, and eat the seeds, or enjoy such delicious treats as pumpkin pie and pumpkin bread.

Pumpkin is also a nutritious money-attractant. Make a pumpkin pie and add cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg to flavor it with money-drawing energies.

Radish

(Raphanus sativus)

Planet:
Mars

Element:
Fire

Energies:
Protection

Lore:
Wild radishes, eaten before breakfast, were once thought to protect the diner from being flogged and to enable one to overcome all obstacles and enemies.

Magical uses:
Slice thinly and eat for protection, especially in salads with onions, bell peppers, and other protective foods.

Rhubarb

(Rheum
spp.)

Planet:
Venus

Element:
Earth

Energies:
Love, protection

Magical uses:
Rhubarb is native to China, where it is still used in medicinal herbalism.
104
All parts of the plant are poisonous save for the red stalks.