Anybody know? It's just one big leaf and a stem. Found a few areas that had lots of them while mushroom hunting.

Looks a bit like blood root, but been a while since I was a youngster digging it...

its not bloodroot...looks like wild ginger to me.

I have some in thewife's flower bed. Wild Ginger. Has a black flower under the leaves, next to the ground. Probably over by now.

yup, it's wild ginger........

The root has a pepper smell to it. If your a root digger you should take a good smell of all your roots. Lots of roots have a very nice smell to them. Another root that smells great is Virginia snakeroot,it has a turpentine or camphor smell and believe it or not bloodroot has a kind vanilla smell once it is dried and bagged, Ginseng also has a smell as does goldenseal. If you don't smell your roots, try it, it is just another benefit to being a wildcrafter.

The shape of the leaves sure look like wild ginger, but the wild ginger on the west coast has leaves that are more glossy than the ones pictured above. I don't know if this is good advice or not, but try chewing on the root; if it has a peppery/ginger taste and has long trailing roots, it's wild ginger. A little brown foul smelling flower is a dead giveaway.

WE boil the cleaned roots in water with enough sugar to make a thick syrup. Then spread the roots out to dry as candied ginger root. The syrup can be botteled and poured on waffles or pancakes. Pretty good. It will also dispell gas.