Herbal Medicine for Preppers: Sweet Woodruff

Hey, y'all, welcome to this week's show. Today, we're going to talk about a really interesting herb. Traditionally it's had a good good amount of use in herbal medicine, also been used culinary culinarily, culinarily, and as an addition to drinks and such, and was specifically used for certain religious festivities. It's a really interesting herb. You're going to probably find it growing somewhere near you. If not, I would highly encourage you to grow at yourself. The reason being that although this herb is legal, it is not intoxicating, it is not any invasive weed. It is really legal to grow, legal to forage and all that. The government doesn't want it to be used, and we'll get into that. But anyway, the name is sweet woodruff, and it's sweet woodruff, however, I should point out, is a name. It's their common name given to several herbs. We're actually discussing the plant Gallium odoratum. What does odorontom mean? Well, it means it has a scent to it. The scent is very much like vanilla, and oddly enough, that's the reason the government doesn't want you to use this herb. Well, it's not mentioned in the oldest rbs, but seems to have found its way into herbal medicine in the Middle Ages, and folklore indicates that sweet woodruf or Gallium odoratum was used for centuries prior than that, I mean, before its medicinal use was documented for its flavor in aroma. The Rodeo Herb Book, which was really good, really good herb Book, written in the early seventies or maybe late sixties somewhere in that era, says that it was used in the fourteenth century. Yeah, there we go. In the fourteenth century the plant was used in Scandinavia and England to make an herb water for cordials as you used to mix into drinks. In Germany, as as the thirteenth century, the herb was used to flavor may wine. That's a really neat tradition throughout the throughout the Middle Urge. Throughout the Middle Ages, woodrough has been used hung in churches and placed in boxes with lavender and roses on special days, such as Saint Peter's feast day in Saint Barnabas's Feast Day. First reference to it in the older herbals is from Gerard writing in the fifteen hundreds but he said that he believed this was a plant mentioned by Pleaning the Elder, But I can't be sure of that. His accurate accuracy as a botanist was not very good. He was a very good gardener, but he was not well educated in botany. Essentially, what happened was this was the very probably the first English herbal if not the first, certainly the most prominent written after the Protestant so called Reformation. When King Henry declared himself the head of the Church of England and had anybody who didn't denounce Catholicism and convert to Anglicanism had their heads cut off. Thousands, tens of thousands of people were slaughtered. All the Catholic colleges and hospitals were confiscated. In their place were put fairly uneducated Protestants, lower class people who did not necessarily speak English, I'm sorry, did not necessarily speak Latin. Of course, he speak spoke English, although it'd be a different, very very different English than we speak now. So the Queen's gardener, who was Gerard, was suddenly elevated to the status of a botanist. He had no idea what he was doing in that regard. He really didn't speak Latin. He got a translation of a botany book from Holland, if I remember correctly, it was Holland to burn him Onteneus, if I remember correctly, and essentially just borrowed from that, and sometimes his plant IDs were not that great. But in the blink of an eye, people very educated in classical schooling, like what we would call doctors and PhDs now were summarily executed, or as he did in Ireland, they just killed half the population and slaved the other half. Pretty much the same in Scotland, slaughtered thousands in Scotland. I mean, I mean, if you want to see the story, look up Saint Thomas Moore, A Man for All Seasons, the movie about it. I mean, Oliver Cromwell was commissioned to go out and just kill all the priests, kill all the monks, kill all the nuns, and kill anybody who didn't say that the King spoke for God. And then they confiscate all their property. And that's the reason why England went from being a place of pretty much pretty good for the freedom for the middle and lower classes and people who weren't royals, to those who were friends of the king owning all the property and all the peasants of England and basically having to give up their property unless they swore to the king, and then they could live on land that was owned by one of the lords. And eventually that's why everybody came to America in search of land. So except for the Irish, of course, who, like I said, half the country was enslaved. The Irish are the most enslaved people on the face of the earth. If you ever think you know when black folks want to tell you how bad slavery was during their era, just say, hey, wait a minute. Millions more Irish were enslaved and actually treated as less than human, worse than black slaves, because they were considered traders to England, and the same is true in Scotland, and the same is true in Wales. There is absolutely nothing good about Anglicanism or Episcopalianism. It is evil to its core. And that's all I have to say of that. And I frankly don't care if you agree with me on that or not. I mean, if you're an honest Protestant, you should look at that era of history and agree that King Henry and his bunch were at least as bad as Adolph Hitler or Stalin. Not good people, not good people at all. But anyway, let's go back to what we were talking about. We're going to quote from Girard, even though what he was talking about was Woodruff. But we're not sure that Pliny was actually talking about Woodruff. But anyway, it seems there may be there's a little confusion there, which will clear up later. He said, most have taken Woodroff to be Plini's ali Alice ali saw a l y S S O s, which, as he saith, does differ from throw throwed in and garden matter. Okay, that's that means nothing to us. I am going to skip over his history because it's probably not even right. He says Woodruff is named of diverse in Latin Asperula odorata, et cetera. And then he does actually mention the Dutch, and that's where he was getting most of his information from. So he says Woodruff is of a temperature something like into our ladies bedstraw. Interesting that they Protestant would still because saying our lady's bedstraw, yes, gallium apparin. I believe it's the name is named after the blessed Virgin Mary within one hundred years he would have been summarily executed for saying such. But anyway, but not so strong, being in a mean between heat and dryness, and that would be Culpeper's time. And boy, I think I'll give you a little history of Culpepper. He was a real character. He was an English Protestant. He was an apothecist about one hundred years after Gerard, and he took the medical books and translated them from Latin into the common language of English, which infuriated the medical establishment because it meant anybody could read them. It infuriated the universities because it meant anybody could read them. So they accused him of being a Catholic, a Jew, and a witch. Yes, there they tried to kill him on those grounds that he was both a Catholic, a Jew, and a witch, or all three combined. Apparently he was none of this sort. In fact, he was fought in the failed English Revolution and was shot and died. But he left us a couple of really good books. Anyway, would rough the virtues it is reported to be put into wine to make a man merry and to be good for the heart, and liver, it prevaileth in wounds and along with other vulnerary herbs. Essentially, he said it more complicatedly, So let's get up to Colepepper. He was his identification was much better. You know, a good one hundred years have passed and things were not quite as chaotic, and people had pretty much established themselves again. And he was an apprenticed apothecus who became a trained and essentially licensed to pothecus until he upset the guild. So like being a member of the union, he was not only blackballed, but they tried to have him killed. So he said a sweet wood rough description. This has a spreading fibrous root with a square stock upright and not much branched eight inches high. You can look it up virtues. Woodroof is accounted nourishing and restorative and good for weakly consumptive people. It opens obstructions of the liver and the spleen, and is said to be a provocative to vinery. I don't even know what that means anyway, that's what he said. But John Keyho, writing another one hundred years later in Ireland, said it has a hot, dry nature. It is good in healing wounds if bruised and then applied, and also in curing boils and inflammations. It is drunk with wine and is good for the heart and useful against inflammations of the liver and obstructions of the gall and bladder. Now continuing in the English tradition, but we're up about the nineteen thirties now, so we're definitely sure of our identifications. Missus Grieve said, this talks about the sweet word rough as she titled it, and says, yes, it is a relative of gallium aprin or bedstraw or also knows cleavers and of goose grass. She says, being a lover of the woods and shady places, it's deep green foliage develops best in half shade where the sunlight penetrates with difficulty. And yes, it's one you're going to find shady woods. Let's see, I'll skip a we'll skip some of the description here because, like I said, you can just google the image. She said. It was mentioned at least by the thirteenth century, being called wood row. In old French novels, it was called mouge de boy or musk of the woods. Interesting, it hits this very aromatic, very vanilla like scent. Some people say that vanilla and musk have a similar smell. I guess I can pick up a little vanilla in musk, but to me, not so much. There was actually a child's nursery rhyme about wood rough. We won't get into all that. Yeah, she recommends it being propagated in orchards under trees, good use of the land, and was a little too rare to use in to harvest from the wild at that point. And by this time she did, they had identified that the substance, the chemical component in woodrough that has that vanilla sent is cumarant. Now we're going to talk a lot about that. You may be familiar with the blood thinner kumidin. Kumidin is essentially a much stronger chemical creation that imitates cumarin. So the main reason our government warns us or really tries to outlaw the use of this herb and several others is because tonka bean Tonka beans another one that's definitely in that category. They say it could be a dangerous blood thinner. Okay, Well, it's only dangerous if you're using like really highly concert trade essential oils or you were consuming huge amounts of it, or if you were on a blood thinner such as kuma den. So we'll get back to that in a little bit. But she says the powdered leaves are mixed with fancy snuffs because of their enduring fragrance and also put into papyric So in the nineteen thirties you might have your some woodroff and your snuff and that would probably be very nice. Actually, you know, if you've ever had some like vanilla scented a pipe tobacco, you know how that you know? So medicinal access actions and uses. Woodruff was much used as a medicine in the Middle Ages. The fresh leaves, bruised and applied to cuts and wounds were said to have a healing effect, and formerly a strong decoction of the herb was used as a cordial and stomatic. It is also said to be useful for removing biliary obstructions of the liver. Billiary, I guess that is what you're supposed to pronounce that. I always see it as bile. Some people say, billiary, I don't care. The plant when gathered has but little odor, but when is dried, has a most refreshing scent of new mown hay, which has retained for years. Now, see that's important. That is the scent of cumerant new mown hay. And like I said, there's several herbs that have that scent, and the government's pretty much tried to outlaw uh most of them. UH says the dried may be kept among limb linen like lavender to who preserved from insects. Middle Ages, it was high in strudent churches. We already talked about that. So now we talked, we've identified the herb and we've given it. We've identified the property, the chemical constituent that gives it that sweet vanilla hay like scent. So let's see what would we say about modern use. Now, Okay, I should give one caveat the I said, don't use you know, a strong a central oil of this one generally speak in tentuous teas, etc. I'm going to say, in my opinion, relatively safe. But of course I have to give the standard disclaimer that the government says otherwise. There is one warning that is very important about any cumaran containing plant. If it is allowed to ferment rot essentially, but ferment, it will get this strong vanilla hay like scent, and then it can actually become very very strong in its blood thinning actions and could actually be dangerous. So if you're going to use any herbs that contain kumaran, you need to harvest them on a dry day. You need to dry them carefully, and you need to make sure that they get air circulation and they do not ferment, because if they did, you know it, you know, I would compare it to taking I've done this before. Actually, if you've ever taken too much aspirin, Like you took a couple of aspirin for a headache or something you forgot and went back like fifteen minutes later and took two more, what's going to happen? Well, your blood pressure is going to go up. Yes, I've done this. Yeah, I'm that dumb, And you're probably gonna get a nose bleed if you don't have a stroke or something, which let's hope you don't, and you're gonna feel really lousy. And if you had, it could kill you if you were taking blood thinners, and if you were taking it, or if you were a weak constitution, but if you took more than that, you could really get in trouble. Well, I've also been a little dangerous with kumber and containing herbs and experienced a similar type effect, So I would definitely say be very careful to keep any herbs that contain kumber. And there's a lot to do. Actually, there's a long list, and I'm sure we'll get to those eventually. But this is, to my mind, the one of the most prominent and definitely one of the most useful, and it's one that I like a lot. So I know, dry it carefully, keep it in a cool, dry place, don't seal it up in a ziplock bag and let it ferment. I mean, just be very real careful with it. And then in my opinion it could be used safely. But again the government says otherwise, so I'm not going to say that officially, but listen anyway, So modern use sweet wood rough Oh this is from plants for a future of course. Sweet Wood roff was widely used in herbal medicine during the Middle Ages, gaining a reputation as an external application to wounds and cuts, and taken internally in the treatment of digestive and liver problems. In current day erbalism and is valued mainly for its tonic, diuretic and anti inflammatory effect. The leaves are anti spasmodic, cardiac, diaphoretic, diuretic, sedative, and infusion is used in the treatment of insomnia and nervous tension, Verico's faints. I think I'll try to pronounce it the right way, biliary obstruction, hepatitis, and jaundice. The plant is harvested just before or as it comes into flour and can be dried for later use. When report says it should be used with caution, whilst another says it it's entirely safe, and I think that's probably really depends on how it's harvest and stored. Excessive doses can produce dizziness and symptoms of poisoning. The dried plant contains cumarans, and these act to prevent the clotting of blood, though in excess doses it can cause internal bleeding. The plant has grown commercially as a source of cumaran, which is used to make the anticoaguoad drug cuminin. Do not use this remedy if you're taking conventional conventional medicine for circulatory problems, or if you're pregnant. A numbers of species in this genus contain asp aspero asperulicide that's hard to say, aspurleucide, a substance that produces cumarin and gives it the scent of new mown hay as the plant dries. Aspurluicide can be converted into postaglandins hormone like compound that stimulates the uterus and blood vessels, making the genus of plants interesting to the pharmacy pharmaceutical industry. Homeopathic remedy is also made for the plant and use the treatment of inflammation of the uterus. Now, while I was researching to do this article, I ran across a really great article on the blog forager Chef. I ended up spending quite a bit of time on this guy's blog. Obviously shared interest right forager Chef. His name's Alan Bergo, and he made a wild vanilla extract out of sweet woodruff, and I just want to read a little bit up to you. He says. Everyone knows how indispensable vanilla is, especially as chefs who buy the whole beans, and yes, do not ever go to the grocery store unless it's an emergency and buy a bottle of vanilla extract. First of all, there's a lot of artificial vanilla extract in the market that's actually made from wood from oak yeap. Oak has vanilla's in it. That's why you know, certain like Chardonnay's can have a vanilla type, or bourbon can have a vanilla type scent and flavor if it's been aged and oak brandy. I mean, that's one of the reasons they use oak. But artificial vanilla extract is chemically produced, pretty nasty stuff from would buy products. Don't don't ever buy that if you can possibly help it. If you buy pure vanilla extract, you're probably going to spend I don't know, seven to ten bucks for what a one or two ounce bottle. I mean, it's just tiny little amount for a great deal of money. Actually, vanilla beans actually come from an orchid, and by the pound, they're around three hundred dollars a pound. Well, what does that mean for you? Go on eBay or Amazon or Etsy or wherever you want to go, or you know, somewhere else. You know, I'm not recommending one of the other I usually buy from and type in vanilla beans, you can usually get them for about three vanilla beans for three to five bucks they'll come from Mexico usually, and they're really nice quality vanilla beans. They're not Madagascar vanilla, but they're way better than anything you're going to buy commercially. They'll be sealed up when you open that package. It's so aromatic you won't believe it. Take your beans, throw them into a pint jar, pour some vodka over them, break them in half, pour some vodka over them, and you've just made a pint of real vanilla extract that will just blow your mind as compared to the fake stuff for around five bucks. And that's what everybody should be doing. Okay, So anyway, he said, if only I'd know them then what I know now, If I go back in time, I could have been using an extract like this one infused with gallium trifolium now made by a distiller friend of mine, instead of buying the spindy vanilla beans. He says, during the three years I spent writing and researching my book, I started working with the plant gallium trifolium trifluorum, basically the same plant. It's sweet wood rough. It's just a we talked for about taxonomists. They keep changing the names of plants. It gets very frustrating. Basically, somebody guy id agree in doing nothing but changing the names of plants, classifying and reclassifying them. And that's how they justify their existence is just to confuse the crap out of everybody that reads their stuff. Anyway. Sweet wood, Oh, he met a chef that made a sweet wood roff pana cotta and it apparently just blew him away. I'm gonna try to skim it a little bit. Uh. Yeah, they were lying cooks together and he found out that his line cook knew and so that he was picking it from the local park. So I don't know where they were in New York, London or somewhere. You know, they're going down to the park and picking sweet wood rough under the trees. So he mentions that they're in the same families, cleavers and bedstraw. And he went and gathered some and they smelled like grass clippings when they're fresh. They really don't smell a lot that scent comes out they when they dried, and he says it smells like fresh cut grass mixed with vanilla. And yeah, that that grassy scent kind of subsides as it dries. And he mentions that cumeran is the reason. Yip yipip, I'm gonna skip ahead, he says. A forager Monica Wilde from Scotland, has done a lot of work with galliums and the cumran, says it's what's fascinating to me is that ever since nineteen fifty four, cumeran containing products in the United States have been illegal. The tonka bean is actually much preferred to vanilla bean. Tonka bean illegal in the United States, he says. Sweet gallium sweet wood rough to my knowledge, are currently not illegal and not regulated, probably because they haven't been used enough to get noticed, but they are still under the ban on anything containing kumeran. So he says, before the band, culinary kumran was used to flavor all kinds of things, from cream soda to vanilla extracts, artificial vanilla extracts which are far preferable to the ones made from wood with cream scented with culinary kumeran. But as recently as two thousand and six, the FDA confiscated tonka beans from the restaurant Lena. So yeah, they're still enforcing that. So as a forager and as a gardener, this is when we can get that other people can't get I'm not gonna say maybe you should sell some under the table, but hey, grid down situation, people are still gonna crave their vanilla flavored sweets, right, I mean people talk about plain vanilla ice cream. Trust me, if you've ever had vanilla ice cream made with real vanilla, oh, by word, and I'm telling you, a real vanilla extract and maybe some pecans just toasted a little bit, caramelized, a little butter and sugar. I mean, it will blow your mind. A real caramel made with real vanilla. I could go on. I mean, it's just absolutely amazing. And go ahead, and you know, order a few of those vanilla beans to give it a try. And if that really appeals to you like it does me, you might want to look into growing sweetwood rough especially for the medicinal properties, but you know, may have some other benefits as well. It's illegal to sell, but it's not illegal to grow. So anyway, yeah, I guess it's gonna wrap it up for home use. I mean, I would definitely say establish it in the garden, learned a forest for it in the woods, But like Miss Greeb said, it's really doesn't grow that abundantly, so it's better to grow now. One thing, you know, a nice oaky chardonnay is just fantastic with a fresh buttered asparagus. The combination of that, the asparagus flavor, with the oakiness of that wine will bring out flavors in your entire meal that you can't even imagine if you've never done that before, hollandaise, sauce, or just just butter with asparagus. And you know, maybe you know, in the Middle Ages they said they infused it as in wine as a popular cordial. I would think that would definitely be worth a try. So anyway, just to leave it there, y'all have a late week, and I will talk to you next time. The information of this podcast is not intended to diagnose or treat any disease or condition. Nothing I say or write has been evaluated or approved by the FDA. I'm not a doctor. The US government does not recognize the practice of verbal medicine, and there is no governing body regulating herbless. Therefore, I'm really just a guy who says herbs. I'm not offering any advice. I won't even claim that anything I write or say is accurate or true. I can tell you what Earth's been traditionally used for. I can tell you my own experience, and if I believe in herb has helped me, I cannot, nor would I tell you do to say. If you use an herb anyone recommends you are treating yourself, you take full responsibility for your health. Humans are individuals, and no two are identical. What works for me may not work for you. You may have an allergy of sensitivity and underlying condition that no one else even shares. And you don't even know about. Be careful with your health by continuing to listen to my podcast or read my blog you read it. Be responsible for yourself, to your own research, make your own choices, and not To blame me for anything ever,