Symphytum: The Comfrey Thread

Is that comfrey?

 

So when selecting my comfrey to eat, I only pick the leaves that are shorter than the distance from my wrist to the top of my middle finger (ie shorther than the length of my hand). I filled up about half a plastic bag-full, and when chopped up it came out to ~4cups.
 
This recipe made about 4 servings. And, it is excellent. I'll probably make it about once a week through the summer. This soup must be served with bread, otherwise you'll have no way of completely cleaning all the deliciousness out of the bowl.
 
To prepare the comfrey, I washed the leaves to get all the dirt off then I removed the tougher stems. To remove them, I cut on either side of the stem

 
Then fold the leaf down and I pull the stem up and towards the tip of the leaf with speed, this rips out the fibrous part of the remaining stem and leaves everything else.
 
Here's how finely I chopped the comfrey. You'll have to draw your blade against the leaf when cutting at first, when you get a big mound you can start rocking the blade back and forth to chop.

 
 
Everything sauteeing together, holy crap that looks great!
 

I think I'll add garbanzo beans next time. The soup has kinda that 'meaty' flavor to it that some dark greens have. I'll be serving this to my friends.
 
 
I chopped up all the stems I removed and fed to my worm bin

 

\tSAFETYWith regard to safety, the absence of genotoxic effects was demonstrated in the bacterial reverse mutation assay (Ames test) for a pyrrolizidine alkaloids (PA)-free comfrey root liquid extract (Benedek et al., 2010). The extract was investigated for its ability to induce gene mutations in Salmonella typhimurium strains TA 98, TA 100, TA 102, TA 1535 and TA 1537 with and without metabolic activation using the mammalian microsomal fraction S9 mix. Reference mutagens were used to check the validity of the experiments. The comfrey root extract showed no biologically relevant increases in revertant colony numbers of any of the five tester strains, neither in the presence nor in the absence of metabolic activation. In conclusion, the fluid extract was not mutagenic in the bacterial reverse mutation assay.
Literature on comfrey often concentrates on PAs, recommending a restriction of the duration of treatment, also with externally applied comfrey preparations. However, in Germany, the restriction limiting application to 4–6 weeks/yr applies only to preparations containing more than 10 µg, but less than 100 µg pyrrolizidine alkaloids (daily allowance; Bundesgesundheitsamt, 1992). Fully licenced medicinal products available today contain depleted or PA-free extracts. The application results in far below the daily allowance of 10 µg. As a consequence there are no restrictions in Germany on these products as regards the duration of treatment (Bundesgesundheitsamt, 1992).
\nsource
\nThe tests that were done to show negative impact of the pyrrolizidine alkaloids in comfrey were done in a way that was impractical. The PAs were isolated and given to rats at very high rates, rates that you wouldn't get close to through eating the plant.
\n\n\nIf there were risks with eating it, I believe it would have become common knowledge a long time ago, with the length of this plant's history in medicine.

 

 
Let me guess...
 
Was it info provided by the FDA?