So Sorrel

Back on the subject of herbal medicine . . .

For whatever reason, (our ancestors called it providence) I would pick this stuff as a little kid and eat it. I liked the tangy flavor.  Pretty amazing that I didn't accidentally kill myself by tasting different plants.  But again, that providence thing.  I have eaten stuff that made me sick, but didn't kill me.  In case you were wondering, daffodils are a powerful emetic. I learned that the hard way when I was 10. Ahhh, digression. But hey, this is my blog, not a Tolstoy novel.

Sheep sorrel in pot with acidic mulch

This little herb that I like so much is considered a nuisance weed by many.  Most people haven't got a clue what it is. To them, it's like crabgrass. This is called Sheep Sorrel.  Not to be confused with common sorrel or plain sorrel.  In reality, it's one of the most powerful medicinal herbs around. So much so, that it is one of the main ingredients in the Essiac® herbal tea treatment for cancer, even up to stage IV ("make sure your will is updated"). Burdock is another main ingredient and I'm pretty sure we have that around here and I will blog on that later.

Sheep sorrel, Rumex acetocella, is delicious in salads, but I even like it by itself.  Here is an excerpt from a website that sells the bulk Essiac tea:

Sheep sorrel is a rich source of oxalic acid, sodium, potassium, iron, manganese, phosphorous, beta-carotene, and vitamin C. The combination of these vitamins and minerals promote the glandular health of the entire body. Sheep Sorrell also contains carotenoids and chlorophyll, as well as citric, malic, and tannic and tartaric acids. 

The chlorophyll can serve many functions in the body. For one, it carries oxygen throughout the bloodstream. This is significant because cancer cells cannot live in the presence of oxygen. Chlorophyll closely resembles hemoglobin in its functioning: both are capable of carrying oxygen to every cell of the organism. When chlorophyll molecules carry oxygen through the bloodstream chromosome damage can be inhibited to effectively block cancer. Chlorophyll also helps block germs and harmful bacteria.

Single Sheep Sorrel leaf

Most of the other sites that I checked out say most of the same stuff. That first ingredient; oxalic acid, is what gives the sheep sorrel its distinctive tanginess, and it is also what gives it its one side-effect; diarrrhea.  BUT, and this is a big BUT, you would have to eat something like a couple of quarts of this stuff to get that effect, unless you have some parasite or other digestive ailment that reacts immediately to all this healthy stuff.  This tends to be true about a lot of things.  The FDA and other idiotic and unnecessary agencies are fond of telling the world that good things can be toxic if you take it in quantities that it would take a herd of cows to eat in a day  in high doses.  Don't get me started on the FDA.  Worse yet, don't get me started on people who think we should even have an FDA. Grrrrr!!

The point I want to make here is: Why wait until cancer begins developing in your body before you change your eating habits?  And no, I'm not talking about eating like you live in a primitive country or giving up all your favorite things, but when I think of the average diet of most Americans, I shudder.  And don't get me wrong, I eat things that other health nuts wouldn't touch, primarily chicken, beef and fish.  But Twyla and I do eat kosher.  Certainly no pork or other animals not considered clean by Torah standards. I used to.  And I thought that giving up shrimp and lobster and oysters was going to be very hard, but guess what?  Not really.  Since I began eating kosher, I haven't had a cold, or any digestive stress or constipation.  I feel so much better.  Imagine that.  The creator of the universe actually knew what he was talking about when he told us what to eat and what not to eat.  For those of you Christians who think that Torah dietary laws are no longer valid, you need to go read Matthew 5:17-20, and then Acts 21:20-24, and those are just for starters.

Anyway, this is another herb in the long list that I will continue posting on.  See the archives in the right hand column to find my past posting on ginger.  If there's an herb you'd like for me to research and post on, leave a comment below.

B'rakhot Adonai,   Moshe

When There Is No Doctor

Everybody say hello to Ginger.

As a flavoring, I've always loved ginger.  It can go well with both sweet and savory dishes.  For versatility in cooking, that's hard to beat.  This has been my first attempt in growing ginger and so far, so good. Since ginger is really tropical, we will have to keep it in pots so it can move back and forth from the greenhouse.The following segment was lifted directly from the University of Maryland Medical school:

Ginger, the underground stem, or rhizome, of the plant Zingiber officinale has been used as a medicine in Asian, Indian, and Arabic herbal traditions since ancient times. In China, for example, ginger has been used to aid digestion and treat stomach upset, diarrhea, and nausea for more than 2,000 years. Ginger has also been used to help treat arthritis, colic, diarrhea, and heart conditions. In addition to these medicinal uses, ginger continues to be valued around the world as an important cooking spice and is believed to help treat the common cold, flu-like symptoms, headaches, and even painful menstrual periods. Native to Asia where its use as a culinary spice spans at least 4,400 years, ginger grows in fertile, moist, tropical soil.

All I did to grow these little plants was to break off a couple of "fingers" from a ginger "hand" that we bought at the local grocery store. I let the little root stub dry out for about a week and then planted it in my own mix of potting soil with just the very top edge exposed to the sun and kept the soil moist.  I've got about a half dozen of these plants in process now.

Since even the head actuary for the Social Security Administration has come out with his own report explaining how there is going to be a dramatic loss of doctors and available health care professionals and facilities once the new "health care" bill goes into effect, it would behoove one to start making plans for the kind of medical care one could expect in places like Cuba or Canada or Great Britain or Zimbabwe, or even worse, like  North Korea.  Add to this scenario the conditions that will exist under "cap and trade", and travel with anything other than bicycles and horse and buggy will be extremely rare, so getting to any kind of modern medical facilities will be a monumental task.

That means that out of sheer necessity, people are going to have to return to the tried and true methods of herbal medicine that have worked for millenia. In some ways, this is really a good thing, since man-made pharmaceuticals tend to make the "cure" worse than the disease.  If you pay attention to the side-affects of most drugs, any natural alternative is far superior.  In addition, many drugs don't really treat the cause, but merely treat or mask the symptoms.

Twyla is a nurse with over two decades of experience including surgical O.R. My university studies were in pre-med biology. I've been dabbling in the use of herbal medications since 1980, and I've often had success where the most help I've gotten from an allopathic doctor was "I don't know; maybe."

Therefore, I'm going to post from time to time on one or possibly two or more herbs or plants that have medical uses.  I'm going to try to give you the best possible pictures and descriptions to help you identify these plants. This is going to be about facts that can be verified.  I'm a big believer in epistemology and logic.  REAL science. Whenever possible, double-blind studies are the best way to verify the truth or falsity of a theory. Anecdotes are useful to discover possibilities, but they don't prove anything.  You must be able to isolate and control variables, and more importantly you must have enough understanding to distinguish between what is objective fact and what is subjective opinion, something that is sorely missing in the modern world.  Most people wouldn't recognize a faulty premise or a coherent syllogism if it walked up and slapped them. This is mainly why the world is in the mess that it's in.

Shalom,  Moshe