poke salad

Meanings

1. A food made from boiled pokeweed leaves, which are poisonous unless cooked properly.
2. Pokeweed, the leafy plant used to make such a dish.

1. A Hawaiian food made from diced raw fish, seasoning, diced fruit and vegetables, and sometimes rice.

Etymology

poke (“pokeweed”) + salad or sallet. “Poke salad” and “poke sallet” mean the same thing—carefully boiled pokeweed. Uncooked pokeweed is poisonous. Given that “salad” connotes “raw,” many speakers favor the original “sallet” which connotes “cooked greens.”