Sometimes called wild parsnip, musky smelling Angelica has some antibacterial properties. Cooks candy this sweet plant and use it as a decoration. You can steam the stems and eat them like asparagus, or cook it with rhubarb to offset that vegetable’s tart flavor. Angelica is used commercially to flavor alcoholic beverages, including gin, vermouth, Benedictine, and Chartreuse.

The plant grows up to 6 feet tall (2 m) and 4 feet (1.2 m) across. Each 2- to 3-foot (0.6- to 1-m), toothed leaf is divided into thirds, which again divides into thirds. The leafstalk has a puffy base; the thick ribbed stems are usually tinged purple.

Softball-sized, off-white starburst flowers open early to midsummer, usually in the plant’s second year. Dramatic cluster-within-cluster seedheads follow; the ribbed seeds are 1/4-inch long with papery wings. Biennial-like, angelica dies after it goes to seed in its second season.

Harvest leaves the first fall, and roots the next spring or second fall. Roots rot quickly after seeds have ripened. Hardy through Zone 3, angelica is one of the few herbs that thrives in dank, dark, and cold. Deeply dug, loamy, acidic, and very moist (but still aerated) soil is best. You succeed best if you live north of Zone 7.

Angelica self-seeds freely, but seeds need light to sprout and can take up to a month to germinate. Tamp the seeds into the soil and thin seedlings to 2 feet (61 cm) in all directions.

Click here to find out which Zone you live in.

Angelica contains furocoumarins, which can make people highly sensitive to sunlight, and some evidence suggests that it contains carcinogens, so limit your consumption.

Fresh roots are poisonous, so be sure to dry them thoroughly. Don’t try to collect angelica in the wild. It looks all too much like the lethal water hemlock, Cicuta maculata, which also grows in wet places.