Water pepper as a seasoning. Calorie content, useful properties, contraindications to use. What dishes can you add peppermint to, interesting facts about the plant. The aroma and taste of the seasoning is provided by organic acids, which have medicinal properties:
- Formic acid has antibacterial properties.
- Acetic acid thickens the blood, irritates the taste buds.
- Valerian - soothes, has a sedative effect.
- Malic acid eliminates edema, has anti-inflammatory and laxative effects.
When using water pepper as a seasoning, the recommended dosages must be observed. Abuse is undesirable, a complex of medicinal components has a too pronounced effect on the body.
Useful properties of water pepper
Properly dried bio-raw materials collected during flowering have healing properties.
The benefits of water pepper for the body:
- Increases blood clotting, increases the strength of the vascular walls;
- Stops internal bleeding: uterine, intestinal, gastric, hemorrhoidal;
- Inhibits the activity of pathogenic bacteria, has an anti-inflammatory effect;
- Destroys plasmodia, which are the causative agents of malaria;
- Stimulates smooth muscle contraction;
- Increases the tone of the body, accelerates the heart rate;
- Has a choleretic effect;
- Has a laxative effect, cleanses the intestines from old toxins, eliminates atony;
- Stops cancerous processes, a pronounced effect has been proven in neoplasms of the stomach and intestines;
- Used in the treatment of peptic ulcer and erosive gastritis;
- Normalizes the thyroid gland, stimulates the production of digestive enzymes;
- Relieves painful symptoms with varicose veins and thrombophlebitis;
- It has a diuretic effect, helps to get rid of calculi in the kidneys and ureters;
- Stimulates the regeneration of soft tissues, accelerates recovery from chronic dermatological diseases;
- It has a pronounced analgesic effect when used internally and externally.
Water pepper is especially useful for women. It reduces the amount of menstrual flow and shortens the duration of your period.
Harm and contraindications to the use of water pepper
Knotweed is a poisonous plant, so it should be introduced into the diet with caution.
Contraindications to the use of water pepper are as follows:
- Individual intolerance.
- Acute inflammatory processes of the urinary system: pyelonephritis, cystitis, glomerulonephritis.
- You can not add water pepper to dishes during pregnancy, so as not to provoke the tone of the uterus and the possibility of miscarriage.
- With hypertension, as blood clots increase blood pressure.
- If you have a history of coronary heart disease, one of the properties of water pepper is to stimulate heart contractions.
In case of an allergic reaction to tinctures of water pepper, it cannot be used not only for treatment, but also as a seasoning. Symptoms indicate intolerance: nausea and dizziness, headaches. In this case, the spice must be discarded. Urticaria occurs only when treated with products made using a useful plant according to folk recipes.
Water Pepper Recipes
Water pepper is used as a seasoning by people from India, China and Vietnam, and this is not surprising. Only fresh shoots of the plant have a characteristic bitter-spicy taste. After drying, useful properties are preserved, and the bitterness disappears.
Water Pepper Recipes:
- Pickled boletus … Banks should be prepared in advance. They are washed with clean water and dried with the lids in the oven. Then spices are spread in them, covered with lids and only then they are engaged in mushrooms. At the bottom of each jar are placed: ground coriander, garlic sliced into slices, sprigs of water pepper and rosemary needles. It is not necessary to wash the boletus. If they are immersed in water, they will absorb it like a sponge, acquire an unpleasant slipperiness, and the pulp will become slimy. If the mushrooms were collected in the rain, they are dried by spreading them out on paper towels. Dirt is cleaned from dry boletus with a cloth, cutting off the places where it has been absorbed. Then the mushrooms are cut, but not finely, otherwise it will be impossible to understand what to eat. In young boletus, the legs are cut, in mature ones, the caps are cut in half. Boil the mushrooms in salted water for 2 minutes, skimming off the foam with a slotted spoon. To prepare the marinade, boil water in a saucepan, add salt, peppercorns - black, pink and allspice. Boil the marinade for 5 minutes, pour in vinegar just before turning it off. The boiled mushrooms are spread over the jars with a slotted spoon, poured with boiling marinade, the lids are rolled up. You can try it in a day, but it is better to wait 1-2 weeks. If you sterilize jars of mushrooms for 10 minutes before rolling, pickled boletus can be stored until spring. The proportions for the blanks are designed for 5 kg of boletus: an almost full glass of vinegar, 10 glasses of water, 15 teaspoons of coarse salt, 50 black peppercorns, 30 fresh sprigs of water pepper, 15 bay leaves, a handful of coriander and a sprig of rosemary in each jar.
- Portuguese chili salad … Chili peppers, 5 pieces, washed, allowed to drain off excess moisture, spread on a paper towel, and cleaned. For this, seeds and white partitions are removed. Cut into strips and quickly fry in a hot skillet in olive oil. Oils are taken quite a bit so that the pepper does not absorb fat. 2 large tangerines are peeled, disassembled into slices, white fibers and films are removed from each, and bones are removed. Cut a slice across into 3 parts. Peel and cut onions into rings, put them in a glass dish, preferably in a jar. Pickled, pouring fresh juice squeezed from half a lemon, and adding a teaspoon of sugar. Close with a lid, stir and leave to marinate for 15-20 minutes. Fluffy panicles are separated from the dill and finely chopped. In a hot frying pan without oil, peeled sunflower seeds and ground hazelnuts are calcined, 3 tablespoons of each ingredient. Overcooking is not allowed, the mixture should acquire a pleasant golden color. For salad dressing, whisk 6 tablespoons of olive oil, lemon juice from the second half of the lemon, freshly ground white pepper and chopped sprigs of water pepper with a whisk. All ingredients are poured into a salad bowl, seasoned, mixed. If necessary, add some salt. The dish is decorated with onion rings. For taste, you can pour in onion marinade.
- Cucumber cream soup … 4 cucumbers are cut into pieces along with the skin. You do not need to try to cut it finely, since all the same, then everything is laid out in a blender. Juice is squeezed out of lime. The avocado is peeled, pitted and cut into approximately 6 pieces. Dip the avocado in lime juice so that the flesh does not darken while the dish is being prepared. Put cucumbers, avocados in a glass of a blender, pour in lime juice and add a little pulp, a pinch of caraway seeds, coriander and a little sea salt. Grind everything to a homogeneous mass and remove for 1-1, 5 hours on a shelf in the refrigerator, after putting in 2-3 sprigs of chopped water pepper. Then the soup is poured into bowls, crumbled feta cheese, ground nutmeg and fresh cilantro are added to each. You don't need to cook the soup - it's practically Portuguese okroshka.
- Mushroom caviar … The water pepper will add a spicy pungency to the dish. For those who do not like bitterness, it is better to do without the unusual seasoning. The ingredients are designed for 1 kg of spongy mushrooms: mushrooms, boletus or boletus. You can make a mushroom platter. Tubular mushrooms are not washed, they are simply cleaned of dirt by cutting off the skin that has eaten in along with it. Mushrooms are passed through a meat grinder. Peel 5 pieces of onion, cut into 4 pieces each. Peel 1/2 kg of carrots, 6 cloves of large garlic, 3 tomatoes, 3 sprigs of rosemary, dill and water pepper. Vegetable slices and greens are also passed through a meat grinder. All ingredients are mixed in a deep enamel saucepan, salted (3 tablespoons of coarse salt). Heat the sunflower oil in a frying pan, boil over low heat to evaporate excess water. The mixture is boiled down to about 1/4. Just before turning off, mix 5-6 black peppercorns, 4 pcs. bay leaf on and off. Can be eaten immediately, can be placed in sterilized jars.
- Pickled beets … Beets, 0.5 kg, washed from dirt, dried with a paper towel, baked in the oven until soft, wrapped in foil. Cut 2 onions, white and red, into thin rings. A glass of water is brought to a boil and the marinade is boiled, pouring into a saucepan: a teaspoon of salt, 5 black peppercorns, 1 bay leaf, 1 sprig of water pepper. Just before turning off, when all the salt has dissolved, pour in 100 ml of 6% vinegar or apple cider vinegar. The beets are taken out of the oven, poured over with running cold water, the skin is removed and grated on a grater in thin slices. Spread the beets in layers, laying with onions, and fill with marinade. Close the container with a lid and put it in the refrigerator for a day.
Water pepper can be added to marinade when preparing tomatoes, in cabbage salad, when cooking beef. An interesting taste is obtained if you use barberry berries with it.
Interesting facts about water pepper
The healing properties of the plant were already known in Ancient Rome and Greece. Fresh leaves and tincture have been used to treat cancer and stop bleeding, and have been used to treat malaria.
In China, water pepper was introduced into the dishes for the nobility as a hot seasoning. Folk healers were not interested in bio-raw materials. The first studies of the properties of peppermint in Russia were carried out at the beginning of the twentieth century, in 1912. The plant was investigated by the Russian pharmacologist Nikolai Pavlovich Kravkov. The hemostatic effect was confirmed. Currently, the drug, a tincture of water pepper on alcohol, is actively used by official medicine.
The plant is valued not only for its medicinal effect. Natural dyes of golden, yellow, green and gray colors can be made from it. The dyes obtained from the peppermint can be used to dye fabrics and shade hair.
The plant is a valuable honey plant.
Watch a video about water pepper:
If in the warm season it is decided to use water pepper as a seasoning, it is advisable to collect the plant in ecologically clean natural areas. It loves wet places, it is often found near highways. Such bio-raw materials are not suitable for food, it absorbs exhaust gases and can provoke intoxication.
