Lesser Galangal Root Alpinia officinarum.

Contents

• Our City: Floating Poems.
• Botanical Basic Data:Galangal.Lesser Galangal.
• Differentiation of Lesser Galangal from Great Galangal.
• Origin of Galangal:Alpiniae Officinarum.Lesser Galangal.
• Description of Galangal:Alpiniae Officinarum.Lesser Galangal.
• Constituents of Galangal:Lesser Galangal.
• Applications of Galangal:Lesser Galangal.
• History of Galangal:Lesser Galangal.
• Historical Notes on the Radix Galangae of Pharmacy.
• Galangal and Cyperus Formula:Liang Fu Wan and Treatment of cold-type pain.
• Galangal formulation activating blood circulation to remove stasis.
• Application Guide,Warnings,Precautions.
• Galangal and Its Magical Use:Hallucinogens and more.
• Galangal and Its Cosmetic Uses:Sun protection.
• Modern Researches of Galangal.

Description of Galangal:Alpiniae Officinarum.Lesser Galangal.:

The genus Alpinia was named by Plumier after Prospero Alpino,a famous Italian botanist of the early seventeenth century.

 The name Galangal is derived from theArabic Khalanjan, perhaps a perversion of a Chinese word meaning 'mild ginger.'

 The galangal has been known in Europe for seven centuries longer than its botanical origin,for it was only recognized in 1870, when specimens were examined that had been found near Tung-sai, in the extreme south of China, and later, on the island of Hainan, just opposite. The name of Alpinia officinarum was given to the herb, as the source of Lesser Galangal.

 The Greater Galangal is a native of Java (A. Galanga or Maranta Galanga), and is much larger, of an orange-brown colour, with a feebler taste and odour. It is occasionally seen at London drug sales, but is scarcely ever used. There is also a resemblance to A. calcarata.The herb grows to a height of about 5 feet, the leaves being long, rather narrow blades, and the flowers, of curious formation, growing in a simple, terminal spike, the petals white, with deep-red veining distinguishing the lippetal.

 The branched pieces of rhizome are from 1 1/2 to 3 inches in length, and seldom more than 3/4 inch thick. They are cut while fresh, and the pieces are usually cylindrical, marked at short intervals by narrow, whitish, somewhat raised rings, which are the scars left by former leaves. They are dark reddish-brown externally, and the section shows a dark centre surrounded by a wider, paler layer which becomes darker in drying.
 

 Their odour is aromatic, and their taste pungent and spicy. They are tough and difficult to break, the fracture being granular, with small, ligneous fibres interspersed throughout one side. The drug is exported, chiefly from Shanghai, in bales made of split cane, plaited, and bound round with cane. The root has been used in Europe as a spice for over a thousand years, having probably been introduced by Arabian or Greek physicians, but it has now largely gone out of use except in Russia and India. Closely resembling ginger, it is used in Russia for flavouring vinegar and the liqueur 'nastoika': it is a favourite spice and medicine in Lithuania and Esthonia. Tartars prepare a kind of tea that contains it, and it is used by brewers. The reddishbrown powder is used as snuff, and in India the oil is valued in perfumery.


 Galangal is popular in Asiatic cooking and was well-known in European medieval cooking. The plant Alpinia galanga (or Languas galangal) has numerous common names, including greater galangal, galangale and galang. It is also known as Siamese ginger or laos, since the plant is indigenous to Southeast Asia, and its rhizome (root) resembles ginger in appearance and in taste. The word galangal is probably derived from the Arabic translation of its Chinese name, liang-tiang, which means wild ginger? Sometimes the word galingale is used for the various galangale and associated gingery rhizomatous spices, but this term has also been used to describe tubers from the roots of certain cypress and sedge plants. These popular tubers of ancient Egypt are now available in Spain, and are know as tiger nuts, earth nuts, or chufa nuts. In Spain a sweet drink that is made from chufa nuts is called horchata; it differs from the Mexican drink of the same name which is made from rice.
 

 Different galangal specimens vary in their hotness and flavor. The spice is said to have a flowery taste, while others describe it as tasting like ginger with cardamom. However, some feel the taste of galangal is more like peppery cinnamon, while lesser galangal has a stronger, hotter, and more medicinal taste. The lesser galangal Languas officinarum is sometimes confused with greater galangal. It comes from China, where it is used as a medicinal herb, but is grown in Indonesia and is regarded as a spice flavor for use in food. Another plant in this group is zedoary, also called white turmeric; this spice is sometimes used in foods, but it is currently of minor importance.

 Galangal and other gingery spices are used in Asia and in the Middle East in cooking, perfumes, snuffs, and aphrodisiacs. The galangal spices have been used as flavors for condiments, including vinegar, beers, and wines in Russia, and they are used in Germany and elsewhere in teas.


 A ruther related group of spicy plants are those members of the Kaemplferia genus, such as Kaemplferia galanga; this is sometimes confused with lesser galangal. See a list of spices by Taste and Hotness.

 Useful Parts The roots of galangal contain the flavor.

 Properties: Pungent in flavor, hot in nature, it is related to the spleen and stomach channels.

Reference:

• 1.Lesser Galangal Root Alpinia officinarum.

This article written and edited via herbalist of MDidea Extracts Professional. They run a range of online descriptions about this herb,including general information related and summarized updating discoveries from findings of professional scientisits this field related.Describe style aimed to form a useful detecting literature space where the intertwined threshold and related questions raise out and visualize themselves.

♣ last edit date:12th,Oct.2010.