Vietnamese Coriander: Benefits and Uses
Many may not know that Vietnamese coriander flowers and fruits on plants that aren’t often cut or harvested. Its branches and leaves serve as both common vegetables and valuable herbs. Here’s why it could be a great addition to your home.
Medicinal Qualities in Oriental Medicine
Vietnamese coriander has a spicy, hot flavor, a pleasant fragrance, and warming properties. It can:
- Ward off coldness
- Boost cognitive function
- Enhance eyesight
- Aid digestion
- Have disinfectant effects
Eating it raw warms the stomach, promotes digestion, disinfects, and expels cold. It also brightens the eyes, sharpens the mind, and strengthens tendons and bones.
Home Remedies with Vietnamese Coriander
- Bloody stomach, indigestion: Take a handful, wash, crush, squeeze the juice and drink. Rub the pulp on the stomach (near the navel).
- Summer heatstroke: Crush fresh coriander, squeeze the juice, boil and drink.
- Poor appetite: Use it as a spice or boil 10 – 20g of the whole plant and drink after meals.
- Stomachache, cold stomach, vomiting, heatstroke, thirst: Drink 25 – 30 ml of fresh red – stemmed coriander juice, twice a day.
- Ringworm, scabies, worms: Soak the whole plant in alcohol and apply the alcohol, or crush and apply the residue.
- Sudden severe heart pain: Boil 50g of the root, add a cup of alcohol, and drink a cup each time.
- Paralysis, bruises, swelling, pain: Crush fresh coriander, mix with camphor or camphor oil, and rub or bandage on the affected areas.
- Flu: Crush a handful of coriander and 3 slices of raw ginger, squeeze the juice to drink. Or boil a mixture of 20g coriander, 20g perilla, 16g Vietnamese balm, 16g Chinese skullcap, 10g Chinese chuanxiong, 10g white peony, and 10g Chinese clematis.
- Snakebite: Crush a handful, squeeze the juice for the victim to drink, and apply the pulp to the wound.
- Foot problems: Crush and apply to the injured area or squeeze juice and apply, twice a day (keep the wound dry).
Caution
Vietnamese coriander isn’t poisonous, but overeating can be harmful. Oriental medicine experts warn that excessive consumption may cause hot and cold sensations, lower energy levels, damage the marrow, and weaken sexual function.