Houttuynia cordata Thunb | make bad breath chewing gum

Houttuynia cordata is also called cauliflower and cen grass, which is often called "broken ear root" by folk. Distribution in China Qinling, Huaihe River south, born in mountainous areas, valleys. Houttuynia cordata has a special fishy smell. Its leaves and roots can be eaten as wild vegetables or used as medicine. It has the effects of clearing heat, eliminating summer heat and detoxifying.

On the wetlands beside streams, under trees and on the slopes, it is suitable for Houttuynia cordata to grow. The ancients classified houttuynia cordata as "grass", meaning grass growing in damp places, because yin qi is too heavy, some people think that eating more houttuynia cordata will damage yang qi and consume essence.

National halitosis programme

During the Spring and Autumn Period, Fu Chai, King of Wu, defeated the army of Yue, and Gou Jian, King of Yue, had to be a courtier and hostage of Wu. In order to win the trust of King Wu and return home as soon as possible to regroup, Gou Jian endured humiliation and gained the favor of King Wu through the "feces tasting incident". Gou Jian claimed to be able to taste human feces and diagnose diseases without fear of nausea to show loyalty. Gou Jian finally returned to Yue, suffered hardships, worked hard, defeated the king of Wu, became a generation of overlords, but taste feces made him fall an incurable problem: bad breath. Advisor Fan Li offered a plan: In the mountains, there is a kind of weed that smells smelly. It is better to call on all the people of Yue, rich and poor, to pick this weed for food.

Because there was no chewing gum to cover up the special stench in the king's mouth, Fan Li suggested this seemingly unwise suggestion. Everyone has bad breath, so the king doesn't have to feel embarrassed. By the way, he can also pick weeds as food, killing two birds with one stone. This incident was recorded in the Spring and Autumn Annals of Wu Yue, which said: "After the king of Yue tasted bad feces, he suffered from halitosis. Fan Li ordered his left and right to eat Cen grass to confuse his qi." Cen grass, also known as Chinese cabbage, because it contains smelly gas, folk called it "Houttuynia." It is said that Fan Li called on the people of Yue to eat Houttuynia cordata collectively. It is named "Mountain" because of Houttuynia cordata. It is located in Shaoxing, Zhejiang Province today.

Houttuynia cordata can grow in pieces in a humid environment, and some people cultivate them in the shade and water as lawns.

Disrespectful wild vegetables

When Du Mu, a great poet of Tang Dynasty, traveled in Xuancheng, Anhui Province, he saw Houttuynia cordata in the mountain stream and wrote the poem "Respect Cen grass floating light, sentence Zhi hydrolysis vein", lamenting that Houttuynia cordata, once eaten by all the people, is now ignored, nostalgic for the past, accompanied by lamenting his own situation. At the beginning, the custom of eating houttuynia cordata continued from Yue to Wu, from Wu to Chu, and from Chu to the more southern and southwestern areas, but it never spread to the Central Plains. People in the Central Plains believed that Houttuynia cordata would cause halitosis and was a kind of food that made people lose etiquette. Only the ignorant Eastern barbarians and southern barbarians would eat it.

Now Henan also has Houttuynia growth, but no one to eat; Jiangsu and Zhejiang areas since the gradual "civilized", Houttuynia no longer loved by people; As for the northerners who have never seen Houttuynia, the first time to eat this, often for three days vomiting. Eating houttuynia cordata is a matter of eating habits. Southerners eat it for a long time, not only do they not think it stinks, but they regard it as delicious. In addition to being used as wild vegetables, the leaves of Houttuynia cordata can also be used to wrap raw fish and slow down the decay speed of fish. In addition, some people use Houttuynia cordata to fry pungent soup to relieve summer heat. From smell to curative effect, it is quite similar to today's Huoxiang Zhengqi Water.