Scented scarab beetle is a herbaceous perennial plant with a stem of four faces. It has a fragrant pleasant smell. This plant has a number of useful healing properties. In various countries, woodruff is considered a medicinal plant. These countries include Austria, Bulgaria, Great Britain, Hungary. Also, this plant is widely used in food production. Other names for fragrant woodruff: odoriferous madder, jasmine, fragrance, fragrant aster, whey grass, fragrant tar, fragrant bedstraw.
Woodruff Description
Bedstraw is a perennial herbaceous plant belonging to the madder family. The grass has a branched and thin rhizome, as well as bare and erect stems with four faces. Its stems are about 10-40 centimeters tall, without branching. Its leaves are arranged in whorls. The lower leaves are broad-lanceolate (6 in the whorl), sharp and small, and the upper ones are lanceolate, located about 8 in the whorl. The fruits of woodruff are dry and have a spherical shape, not exceeding 3 mm in diameter. They are covered with hook-shaped bristles. The flowers of the plant are small, usually white, as well as regular tubular-bell-shaped, and in addition, they are collected in paniculate corymbose inflorescence. The flowering fragrant bedstraw occurs in May and June, and begins to bear fruit in July. A dry plant emits a sophisticated coumarin aroma.
Woodruff habitats
Sweet woodgrass can usually be seen in the forest-steppe as well as in the forest zone located in the CIS countries, in the Mediterranean, in the European part of Russia (not in the north), in the south of the Far East and Siberia, in the Caucasus. It grows in broad-leaved and mixed, as well as in damp and dark coniferous forests. As a rule, woodruff grows on moist soil with humus, along river banks in the forest and ravines. A lot of it grows in beech forests, as well as in mountainous areas to the mid-mountain zone.
Collection and Harvesting
The plant is harvested and harvested from the beginning of May until the end of June. For harvesting, the aerial part is used, which is cut off during the flowering of woodruff. Cut it close to the ground, and after that the grass is collected in a bunch and thoroughly dried in a dark and dry room. Storage is carried out in well-closed containers for no more than 1 year.
Description of the composition of odorous and fragrant woodruff
In its composition, the bedstraw contains many useful and effective substances: coumarins, various tannins, flavonoids, various acids (tartaric, malic, catechin, oxalic, silicic), vitamin P and C.
The root of the plant contains anthraquinones (alizarin, rubiadin, purpurin) and coumarins. The leaves contain chlorogenic and phenolcarboxylic acid, a variety of tannins, flavonoids, iridoids (deacetyl asperuloside), vitamin C and carotenoids.
Scented scaffold: medicinal properties and contraindications
The plant has both medicinal properties and contraindications. Scented sculata is not a plant used in traditional medicine. It is used for various skin diseases as a wound healing and astringent, due to the content of tannins in it. The anti-inflammatory effect is exerted by the active substance lactone asperuloside. It also performs an antispasmodic function, affecting smooth muscles. And coumarins, which are part of the plant, provide treatment for nervous diseases and stop the pain syndrome. A variety of extracts and tinctures from aromatic woodruff (galenic preparations) expand the capillaries, as well as increase blood circulation, while they do not change blood viscosity.
A contraindication to use may be the period of pregnancy and lactation. The plant is poisonous, therefore it is dangerous to cause an allergic reaction to it, and in addition, it can cause poisoning with its accompanying symptoms: headache, vomiting and dizziness.
Woodruff
Means with fragrant woodruff soothe the nervous system, stimulate sweating and urine output, improve metabolic processes, give a painkiller effect, heal wounds, eliminate seizures and tantrums, improve sleep and heart function. Decoctions and infusions are used in alternative medicine as a means with a diuretic effect in case of inflammation of the genitourinary system, nephrolithiasis, dropsy and cystopielitis. Infusions from woodruff root are usually taken in the treatment of seizures, as well as to tone the entire body. With prostatitis, woodruff is used in a mixture with other herbs.
In some countries, odoriferous woodruff is used as a means to improve blood circulation, and in addition, a slight staining of white skin.
This plant serves as food for rural animals. Dried woodruff flowers are an excellent remedy against moths.
Use of woodruff in food production
Oasis scent is very important nutritional value. Since it is a fragrant spicy herb containing bitterness, coumarin and tannin components, it is used to give the original taste to culinary dishes. To find out what woodruff is like, you should try dishes that contain it. The leaves of the plant are usually added to fruit and vegetable salads, dried fruit compotes and a variety of sweet soups. It is also used to add flavor to various drinks: lemonade, teas, wines, liquor.
Aromatic woodruff and chocolate are also very related, since the plant is added to chocolate to give it an interesting and original taste. In France, woodruff is used as an indispensable ingredient for champagne, in Switzerland - benedictine, and in America - an unrivaled wine punch, which consists of a mixture of cognac, wine and benedictine. Coffee substitute is made from roasted seeds of a plant. From the flowers, stems and seeds of the plant, a milk-clotting enzyme is made. Still woodruff grass is used in the perfume of clothing and tobacco.
In Germany, fragrant woodruff is very popular as an ingredient for a drink called Maibowle. The plant for some time insist on wine, sugar, cognac and orange peel are also added to it.
In northern Europe, woodruff is used to flavor several types of smoked products.
