Pot liquor, sometimes spelled potlikker or pot likker, is the liquid that is left behind after boiling greens (collard greens, mustard greens, turnip greens) or beans. It is sometimes seasoned with salt and pepper, smoked pork or smoked turkey. Pot liquor contains high amounts of essential vitamins and minerals including iron, vitamin A and vitamin C.
In the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador, the term pot liquor is used to describe the broth left over from boiling multiple vegetables (potato, carrot, cabbage, etc.), usually with the dish known as Jiggs Dinner.
The consumption of potlikker was common among enslaved people in the United States to concentrate nutrients from vegetables. Most people crumble cornpone (corn meal mixed with a little salt and water, made into a pattie and baked until it is hard) into the potlikker.
In 1935, governor and U.S. senator Huey Pierce Long, Jr., of Louisiana presented a treatise on potlikker during a 15-hour filibuster. In his autobiography, Every Man a King, he defined "potlikker", a favorite of his country political supporters, as
Former governor and U.S. senator Zell Miller of Georgia wrote a defense of the traditional spelling "potlikker" in a letter to The New York Times.