Grow your own drugs: a medicine cabinet in your garden
Botanist James Wong raids the flowerbeds for cures to everyday ailments from coughs to eczema, timesonline.co.uk march 2, 2009
On one bitterly cold day recently James Wong found himself walking home in a light coat. He's an optimist, he explains. But just to make sure he didn't get a cold, when he got home he made his granny's chicken soup, using echinacea root, goji berries and extreme quantities of ginger, chillies and garlic.
“Well, I didn't get a cold,” he says. “It's something I make all the time. In Asia you don't have a big thick dividing line between food and medicine. That soup would be eaten as dinner even if you weren't feeling under the weather.”
Wong's recipe for his Immune System Booster is in his book, Grow Your Own Drugs, a set of instructions for plant-based remedies and beauty products that accompanies the eponymous BBC Two series. The title may seem provocative but Wong is an engaging geek (the geek bit is his word) with a mission: he wants people in the West to start looking at plants not as soft furnishings but as chemical factories that are the source of elixirs for everything from insomnia to cystitis and head lice.
Before you dismiss the idea of natural healthcare as flaky, he points out that many plants contain the same active ingredients as over-the-counter drugs. Aspirin, though now synthetic, was originally derived from sal acetic acid which is found in willow, meadowsweet and the shrub spirea. Morphine-based painkillers are based on opium from poppies, and the contraceptive pill was originally isolated from the Mexican wild yam. The World Health Organisation estimates that 80 per cent of the world's population relies on plant-based medicine as its key form of healthcare.
“It's cultural. In Malaysia, where I spent a lot of my childhood, Western medicine came along and was considered useful, but as an adjunct to traditional medicine that never went away. In Northern Europe the Industrial Revolution meant that people were ripped out of the countryside, where they had this rich ethnobotanical knowledge, and popped into cities. Within a couple of generations all that knowledge is lost. There's very little methodology to pass on.”
Wong is 27 and an ethnobotanist - a scientist who studies the use of plants. It was at his grandmother's home in Malaysia that he absorbed the idea that plants aren't just pretty, but that many of them can be functional. “We'd walk around my grandmother's back garden and she'd rip off a leaf of a palm tree and a couple of minutes of origami later she'd have a perfectly usable hat that would last for quite a long time,” he says.
“The plant next to it was one they used to stitch injuries together during the Second World War. Not only was it fibrous but it had antiseptic qualities. It was magical to me as a kid that you could do so much with the things most people walk past. People have this idea that you have to hike to the depths of the Amazon to find the source of plant-based medicines, and that once you have got them you need a fully equipped pharmaceutical laboratory full of people in white coats preparing this stuff in really elaborate processes.
“That's a myth. Plant-based medicines have evolved as a response to situations where people don't have a lot of time or money. When I was studying shamanic medicine in Ecuador, if a woman had eight kids and one of them had stomach ache, she had to find something in her immediate environment that she could cook up on the stove while taking care of her other seven children.”
What about evidence that this stuff works? Where are the clinical trials to support the use of chicken soup as an immune system booster? They don't exist, of course, because drug companies don't invest in expensive trials unless they know they will get a return in sales. Wong is careful not to make claims that he can't back up, and his book includes a number of disclaimers - consult a doctor before trying natural remedies, and particularly if you are on any other medication, check for allergies, make sure you have identified the plants you use correctly, and so on. “We're not saying this headache remedy is clinically proven to cure headaches, but that the plants in it contain ingredients that have been demonstrated to have an effect. The chemicals in them demand as much respect as a conventional drug and can be considered a drug.”
There is a Blue Peter-ish charm in Wong's message and it chimes well with the credit-crunch enthusiasm for anything homemade and economical. Many of the ingredients are easily available and you don't need specialist equipment to make them. Wong, who shares a house with fellow botanists in West London, recalls how one housemate spent £25 on echinacea tincture. “I said do you know what's in it? It's just echinacea chopped up and stuck in vodka for a couple of weeks. There's echinacea in the garden, and I've got bottles of vodka that people have left behind at parties. I don't drink it, I use it to make traditional remedies.”
Grow Your Own Drugs, BBC Two. The book, by James Wong, is published by HarperCollins at £16.99. Available from Times BooksFirst for £15.29, free p&p. 0870 1608080, timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst
Sage honey for sore throat
Pungent sage leaves (Salvia officinalis) contain antiseptic, anti-inflammatory and decongestant properties. The herb that it takes its name from the Latin verb “to save”. Combined with the antibacterial and healing properties of honey, this makes a great soother.
Ingredients:
1 large bunch fresh sage leaves
Enough runny honey (buy sage honey if you can) to cover the leaves
Method:
1. Wash and dry the sage leaves and place in a small pan with enough honey to cover. Simmer gently for 1 hour. Allow to cool to a temperature you can handle. (Be careful; sugar solutions and honey can become very hot and cause scalding.)
2. Strain the honey into a sterilised jar containing a sprig of sage, if desired.
Use:
Take 1 tsp whenever needed to soothe a sore throat. You can also use to sweeten and medicate hot lemon drinks for colds and flu; take 3-4 times a day when needed.
Goji Berry and Shitake Soup to boost your immune system
In China, soups rather than teas are the traditional way of administering health-giving herbs. This one is packed with nutrients that help to boost immunity and generally ease the symptoms of colds and flu. Eat this soup as soon as you feel a cold coming on.
Ingredients:
2 tbsp dried Echinacea root
200 ml water, freshly boiled
5 tbsp goji berries, fresh or dried
2 litres chicken stock (homemade or from stock cubes)
3 chicken thighs or drumsticks (preferably organic)
2 large onions, peeled and sliced
12 shitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
10 cm root ginger, peeled and shredded
2 fresh medium-sliced chillies, finely sliced
8 garlic cloves, chopped
Extra sliced ginger and chillies, to serve
Method:
Combine the dried echinacea root with the water in a bowl to make a simple infusion. In another bowl, pour just enough cold water over the goji berries to cover, and leave to rehydrate. Set the echinacea and goji berries aside and leave to stand.
Place the stock and chicken pieces in a large pan or slow cooker. Add the sliced onions, mushrooms, ginger and chillies and place around the chicken in the pan. On a very low heat, simmer gently for 1½ - 2 hours, or until the chicken is tender and falls apart. Take off the heat.
Five minutes before serving, add the goji berries and chopped garlic. Finally, strain the Echinacea infusion and add this to the soup, reheating if necessary.
Use:
Serve by ladling into bowls and garnishing with sliced ginger and chilli for an extra kick.
Where to buy fresh echinacea root (dried or fresh) if you're in the US? Falconridge Farms California
Grow your own drugs: a medicine cabinet in your garden
Botanist James Wong raids the flowerbeds for cures to everyday ailments from coughs to eczema, timesonline.co.uk march 2, 2009
On one bitterly cold day recently James Wong found himself walking home in a light coat. He's an optimist, he explains. But just to make sure he didn't get a cold, when he got home he made his granny's chicken soup, using echinacea root, goji berries and extreme quantities of ginger, chillies and garlic.
“Well, I didn't get a cold,” he says. “It's something I make all the time. In Asia you don't have a big thick dividing line between food and medicine. That soup would be eaten as dinner even if you weren't feeling under the weather.”
Wong's recipe for his Immune System Booster is in his book, Grow Your Own Drugs, a set of instructions for plant-based remedies and beauty products that accompanies the eponymous BBC Two series. The title may seem provocative but Wong is an engaging geek (the geek bit is his word) with a mission: he wants people in the West to start looking at plants not as soft furnishings but as chemical factories that are the source of elixirs for everything from insomnia to cystitis and head lice.
Before you dismiss the idea of natural healthcare as flaky, he points out that many plants contain the same active ingredients as over-the-counter drugs. Aspirin, though now synthetic, was originally derived from sal acetic acid which is found in willow, meadowsweet and the shrub spirea. Morphine-based painkillers are based on opium from poppies, and the contraceptive pill was originally isolated from the Mexican wild yam. The World Health Organisation estimates that 80 per cent of the world's population relies on plant-based medicine as its key form of healthcare.
“It's cultural. In Malaysia, where I spent a lot of my childhood, Western medicine came along and was considered useful, but as an adjunct to traditional medicine that never went away. In Northern Europe the Industrial Revolution meant that people were ripped out of the countryside, where they had this rich ethnobotanical knowledge, and popped into cities. Within a couple of generations all that knowledge is lost. There's very little methodology to pass on.”
Wong is 27 and an ethnobotanist - a scientist who studies the use of plants. It was at his grandmother's home in Malaysia that he absorbed the idea that plants aren't just pretty, but that many of them can be functional. “We'd walk around my grandmother's back garden and she'd rip off a leaf of a palm tree and a couple of minutes of origami later she'd have a perfectly usable hat that would last for quite a long time,” he says.
“The plant next to it was one they used to stitch injuries together during the Second World War. Not only was it fibrous but it had antiseptic qualities. It was magical to me as a kid that you could do so much with the things most people walk past. People have this idea that you have to hike to the depths of the Amazon to find the source of plant-based medicines, and that once you have got them you need a fully equipped pharmaceutical laboratory full of people in white coats preparing this stuff in really elaborate processes.
“That's a myth. Plant-based medicines have evolved as a response to situations where people don't have a lot of time or money. When I was studying shamanic medicine in Ecuador, if a woman had eight kids and one of them had stomach ache, she had to find something in her immediate environment that she could cook up on the stove while taking care of her other seven children.”
What about evidence that this stuff works? Where are the clinical trials to support the use of chicken soup as an immune system booster? They don't exist, of course, because drug companies don't invest in expensive trials unless they know they will get a return in sales. Wong is careful not to make claims that he can't back up, and his book includes a number of disclaimers - consult a doctor before trying natural remedies, and particularly if you are on any other medication, check for allergies, make sure you have identified the plants you use correctly, and so on. “We're not saying this headache remedy is clinically proven to cure headaches, but that the plants in it contain ingredients that have been demonstrated to have an effect. The chemicals in them demand as much respect as a conventional drug and can be considered a drug.”
There is a Blue Peter-ish charm in Wong's message and it chimes well with the credit-crunch enthusiasm for anything homemade and economical. Many of the ingredients are easily available and you don't need specialist equipment to make them. Wong, who shares a house with fellow botanists in West London, recalls how one housemate spent £25 on echinacea tincture. “I said do you know what's in it? It's just echinacea chopped up and stuck in vodka for a couple of weeks. There's echinacea in the garden, and I've got bottles of vodka that people have left behind at parties. I don't drink it, I use it to make traditional remedies.”
Grow Your Own Drugs, BBC Two. The book, by James Wong, is published by HarperCollins at £16.99. Available from Times BooksFirst for £15.29, free p&p. 0870 1608080, timesonline.co.uk/booksfirst
Sage honey for sore throat
Pungent sage leaves (Salvia officinalis) contain antiseptic, anti-inflammatory and decongestant properties. The herb that it takes its name from the Latin verb “to save”. Combined with the antibacterial and healing properties of honey, this makes a great soother.
Ingredients:
1 large bunch fresh sage leaves
Enough runny honey (buy sage honey if you can) to cover the leaves
Method:
1. Wash and dry the sage leaves and place in a small pan with enough honey to cover. Simmer gently for 1 hour. Allow to cool to a temperature you can handle. (Be careful; sugar solutions and honey can become very hot and cause scalding.)
2. Strain the honey into a sterilised jar containing a sprig of sage, if desired.
Use:
Take 1 tsp whenever needed to soothe a sore throat. You can also use to sweeten and medicate hot lemon drinks for colds and flu; take 3-4 times a day when needed.
Goji Berry and Shitake Soup to boost your immune system
In China, soups rather than teas are the traditional way of administering health-giving herbs. This one is packed with nutrients that help to boost immunity and generally ease the symptoms of colds and flu. Eat this soup as soon as you feel a cold coming on.
Ingredients:
2 tbsp dried Echinacea root
200 ml water, freshly boiled
5 tbsp goji berries, fresh or dried
2 litres chicken stock (homemade or from stock cubes)
3 chicken thighs or drumsticks (preferably organic)
2 large onions, peeled and sliced
12 shitake mushrooms, thinly sliced
10 cm root ginger, peeled and shredded
2 fresh medium-sliced chillies, finely sliced
8 garlic cloves, chopped
Extra sliced ginger and chillies, to serve
Method:
Combine the dried echinacea root with the water in a bowl to make a simple infusion. In another bowl, pour just enough cold water over the goji berries to cover, and leave to rehydrate. Set the echinacea and goji berries aside and leave to stand.
Place the stock and chicken pieces in a large pan or slow cooker. Add the sliced onions, mushrooms, ginger and chillies and place around the chicken in the pan. On a very low heat, simmer gently for 1½ - 2 hours, or until the chicken is tender and falls apart. Take off the heat.
Five minutes before serving, add the goji berries and chopped garlic. Finally, strain the Echinacea infusion and add this to the soup, reheating if necessary.
Use:
Serve by ladling into bowls and garnishing with sliced ginger and chilli for an extra kick.
Where to buy fresh echinacea root (dried or fresh) if you're in the US? Falconridge Farms California
