In most people's impressions, the presence of dandelions is basically the same as that of weeds, at most, the inflorescence is beautiful, the flowers are romantic, the seeds can fly, and there is nothing more to be desired. But in fact, dandelion has many unknown aspects, such as leaves can be used as vegetables, roots can be used for medicine, which is not only recorded in ancient books, but also can be found in today's national medicinal and food homology directory, in addition, its flowers can also be made into dyes, and roots can even replace coffee.
Do you know what the flower language of dandelions is? (Picture from wiki)
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Taxonomically, the word dandelion has two meanings, one refers to the genus and the other refers to the species.
From a genus point of view, dandelion/Taraxacum belongs to the order Asterales/Asteraceae; Asteraceae is a dicotyledonous plant with 11 families, of which the Asteraceae family is the largest, with 13 subfamilies, 1900 genera, and more than 32,000 species. Asteraceae is characterized by cephalic inflorescences, specific to the genus Dandelion, there are also hollow flower stems, synphytic anthers, thin fruits with white crown hairs, and leaves with toothed and spineless leaves, which are widely distributed in temperate to subtropical.
The picture on the left is a dandelion in Tatebayashi City, Japan (self-edited)
The so-called cephalic inflorescence refers to a large number of sessile florets clustered or surrounded by a flower shaft, which is also expanded into spherical or disc-shaped or even compounded; these sessile florets have two kinds of tongue-shaped and tubular flowers, tongue-shaped flowers generally grow on the periphery of the inflorescence, and tubular flowers are clustered in the center of the inflorescence.
The cephalic inflorescences of the Asteraceae family usually have the following three types:
Only tongue-shaped: dandelion, chicory
Only tubular: thistle, thistle
It has two forms: sunflower and aster
Schematic diagram of the cephalic inflorescence (self-edited)
From the species point of view, dandelion itself is the abbreviation of Mongolian dandelion, the scientific name of Taraxacum mongolicum; English Dandelion is the common name of all dandelions, Chinese there are dandelions, mother-in-law and other common names. As for how many species of this genus there are, there is still no conclusion, from dozens to thousands, some people have advocated, according to Yuan Changqi's "China Wild Plant Resources" on "dandelion Materia Medica argument and species identification", there are about 70 species in China, and the more common ones are as follows:
Mongolian dandelion /Taraxacum mongolium
Hua Dandelion/Taraxacum sinicum (alias borealisinense)
Northeast Dandelion /Taraxacum ohwianum
Heterobranium dandelion/Taraxacum multisectum (synonym heterolepis)
Asian dandelion/Taraxacum scariosum (synonymasiaticum)
Spotted dandelion /Taraxacum variegatum
White-rimmed dandelion/Taraxacum platypecidum
Mustard dandelion /Taraxacum brassicaefolium
Big-headed dandelion /Taraxacum calanthodium
The suffix names in parentheses were originally stated in the original text, but after checking GBIF, it was found that many of them were different names, so they corrected it. In addition, the most common species of dandelion in foreign countries is T. officinale with T. erythrospermum。
Four kinds of dandelions common at home and abroad (self-edited)
To identify dandelion species, we must not only look at the leaves, flowers, and roots, but also refer to the shape and size of the outer bracts, the shape of the fruit body of the lean fruit, and the size of the tongue-like flower tongue pieces.
How to distinguish dandelion varieties (self-edited)
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Now that you've learned about the body structure of dandelions, let's explore its lesser-known side.
1. Dandelion wild vegetables
Long ago, people knew that dandelions could be eaten, and roots, flowers and leaves could be eaten! Especially the leaves, cold mixing, frying in oil, boiling soup, and even mixing meat to make filling, all of them are indispensable; even after the leaves are dried, they can be used as tea leaves!
The English language is usually written as dandelion greens
For example, the "Tang Materia Medica" has such a record: "The leaves of dandelion grass are like bitter lettuce, the flowers are yellow, there is white juice, and everyone eats it"; Li Shizhen's "Compendium of Materia Medica" lists dandelions in the "vegetable department", which is called "stems, leaves, flowers, and wool and resemble bitter lettuce, but small ears, young seedlings can be eaten". There are also many foreign records, such as in the Victorian era in Britain, where the upper class even regarded dandelions as a delicacy to make salads or sandwiches.
A_curious_herbal (from wiki)
So why is there so little in the market now?
Because it's bitter.
Of course, if you are used to eating bitter melon, you may not feel anything. In addition, if it is picked in the early spring in April and May, it is at this time when the dandelion leaves are stretching, and it is not too bitter to eat. There have been improved commercial varieties abroad, called tetraploid giant dandelions, which look like spinach and have crisp and tender leaves when eaten.
Image courtesy of Wiki
2. Dandelion herbs
The leaves and roots of dandelion can not only be used as a dish, crisp and refreshing, but also can be used as medicine, with the effect of clearing the stomach and intestines.
The Compendium of Materia Medica records: "Dandelion is the main treatment of women's breast carbuncles, boiled juice drinking and sealing of immediate elimination." Detoxify food, disperse stagnant qi, clear heat poison, dissolve food poison, eliminate malignant swelling, tuberculosis, and boils. This sentence can be summarized as "clearing heat, detoxifying, reducing swelling and loosening knots". Coincidentally, foreign countries also have such a general knowledge: dandelion root has appetizing, diuretic, milk, anti-edema effect.
The root of the dandelion
Nowadays, many proprietary Chinese medicines are also refined from dandelions, such as dandelion tablets, dandelion capsules, etc., to treat colds, headaches, anti-inflammatories and anti-viruses.
3. Dandelion coffee
In addition to being used as a medicinal herb, dandelions can also be roasted and ground into powder and rinsed into coffee! Because it has a coffee-like smell, appearance, and taste, but does not contain caffeine, it is also regarded as a substitute for low-factor coffee. In the past, in the Economic Difficult Period in the West, there were many poor people who used it as a coffee substitute, and the Canadian writer Susanna Moodie wrote about the method of making dandelion coffee in his memoirs in 1852, and by 1919, dandelion had become widely known as an alternative to coffee. Among alternative coffees, though, chicory coffee is more famous.
Flowers, leaves, and roots of chicory (image collected from the Internet)
Making dandelion coffee is actually very simple, first of all, the dandelion root is dried after cutting, then finely cut, roasted, and then ground into powder to be no different from coffee powder.
Dandelion making process (self-edited)
4. Dandelion dye
After the dandelion flowers are dried, they are ground into a powder and can be used as a yellow dye.
Europeans even used dandelion flowers to make wine in the Middle Ages.
Dandelion flower (from Wiki)
When the flower stem is cut off, it also secretes latex, which is very similar to the rubber of the rubber tree, and there are manufacturers currently studying the use of dandelion rubber mixtures to make tires.
Latex compound of dandelion root (picture from the network)
Finally, get to know the dandelion flower language, which usually has these 3 flower languages:
"I pray for your happiness from afar"
"Love that can't stay"
"God's Will"