Eastern white pine
Pinus strobus
Five-needled white pine. A traditional vitamin-C-leaning needle tea in some outdoor practices. Yew is toxic and is not a pine. Don’t brew mystery evergreens.
GROW → HARVEST → EAT → DRY → POWDER → CAPSULE → GUMMY — forms are not equivalent. Food first.
Identity
What it is
Five-needled white pine. A traditional vitamin-C-leaning needle tea in some outdoor practices. Yew is toxic and is not a pine. Don’t brew mystery evergreens.
Identification
Bundles of five long soft needles; cones. Yew has flat needles in two ranks and red arils.
Edible portions
- needles as a traditional tea, not a salad
Absence of a portion from this list means it is not treated as food here — not that every other part is toxic.
Growing
- Climate. 3–8 tree
- Light. Full sun
- Soil. Well-drained, acid-leaning
- Planting. A large forest tree.
- Harvest. Young needles from a known Pinus, not Taxus.
Preparation and culinary uses
- Steeped needle tea in outdoor cookery
Nutrition and compounds
- Vitamins (qualitative, well-known associations). vitamin C (needles — amounts vary; this is a tea, not a tablet) — not milligram values.
AAA interpretation Food first. These associations explain why a plant shows up in a nutrient conversation — they are not a supplement shopping list.
Safety
- Yew (Taxus) is toxic. Identify five-needled white pine vs other evergreens. Pregnant people are often advised to skip pine-needle tea folklore. Food-first still prefers an orange.
Next steps
Sources
- USDA PLANTS Database — taxonomy and range (verify current entries)
- USDA FoodData Central — nutrient profiles for foods (verify current entries; this page does not invent milligrams)
- State cooperative extension growing guides — verify for your region
Honest incompleteness is preferred to fabricated completeness. If a section is missing, no record for it is attached here — not a claim that the plant lacks that characteristic, and not that it was omitted as a secret.
Internal quality class A. Strong page: distinctive plant facts plus practical growing or kitchen use.