The honest answer is no. Traditional sassafras tea is not considered safe to drink. No health authority calls sassafras tea safe today. The tea brewed from the raw root holds a compound called safrole. That is the same chemical the FDA pulled from the food supply long ago. You can still enjoy the flavor. You just should not get it from the old home-brewed root.
Here is the concrete problem. Sassafras root bark tea is the kind families simmered on the stove for years. That brew holds safrole in real amounts. Safrole is the exact compound regulators flagged as a health risk. So the cozy old recipe is not a safe pick. It does not matter how long people have brewed it.
Safrole is the part that worries scientists. Federal health agencies say it is likely to cause cancer in people. They base that on lab tests. Rats and mice fed safrole grew liver tumors. That result is the main reason the old tea is no longer recommended. Your liver has to break the compound down. The breakdown is where the trouble may start.
Think about how much you would take in over time, too. One cup will not match a lab dose. But people rarely stop at one cup. They brew the tea by the pot, week after week, for years. That steady habit is what raises the worry. A risk that looks small in a single mug adds up across a long stretch.
It helps to know where safrole lives in the plant. The compound sits in the bark of the root, which is the part used for the classic tea. The leaves are a different story. Ground sassafras leaves make file powder, the thickener used in gumbo, and that product holds little to no safrole. So the worry is tied to the root bark, not to every use of the plant.
The FDA banned safrole and sassafras oil from food and drinks in 1960 after rodent studies tied the compound to liver tumors. That ban still stands.
The timeline matters here. The 1960 ban covered safrole and sassafras oil. It also covered the root bark used to brew tea. Years later, scientists took a second look. A re-analysis out of Lawrence Berkeley asked a fair question. Does the rodent risk really map onto people? Georgia's Department of Natural Resources notes this point. Even so, the ban was never lifted. The rule still treats safrole as a risk. So the cautious read is to skip the traditional brew.
You do have a way to keep the taste without the gamble. Makers now strip the risky compound out. They sell safrole free sassafras products. You can find these as teas, syrups, and root-beer flavorings. You get the warm aroma without the banned chemical. Read the label before you buy. Look for the words safrole free. That one check tells a modern product apart from the raw old root.
This is also why store root beer is fine while a backyard brew is not. The drink got its signature taste from sassafras long ago. Today that flavor comes from safrole free extracts or other blends. So the soda on the shelf is not the same as tea from a freshly dug root. The label and the source make all the difference.
So what should you actually do? If you want the flavor, reach for a safrole free option. Do not dig up a root and simmer it yourself. And if you have a health condition, take medication, or are pregnant, talk to a doctor or pharmacist first. Do that before you drink any sassafras product at all. A quick chat beats guessing with a compound this fraught. Until someone proves the old brew sassafras tea safe, skip the traditional root-bark tea. Let the flavor come from a product that took the safrole out.
Read the full article: Sassafras Tree: Leaves, Uses and Safety
