Lactuca sativa (Lactuca sativa) Asteraceae, lettuce genus, a biennial herb. Lettuce can be divided into two categories: leaf and stem. Lettuce has a lot of names, in the herb book called "Chien Jin Cai", "lettuce" and "Chicory". Leaf lettuce is also known as lettuce, stem lettuce giant is also known as lettuce, bamboo shoots. China's cultivated area of lettuce than lettuce more. The flesh of lettuce is tender, and the stems can be eaten raw, cold, fried, dried or pickled. Lettuce is mainly eaten leaves or leafballs, in recent years in the major cities, especially in the southern coastal provinces of the development of large cities, to become the current increase in fancy varieties of the main vegetables. Lettuce stems and leaves contain lettuce pigment, bitter flavor, high temperature drought bitter taste, can enhance gastric juice, stimulate digestion, enhance appetite, and has analgesic and hypnotic effect.
Characteristics: lettuce root system is shallow and dense, more distributed in 20 cm - 30 cm soil layer. Seedling leaves are interspersed on the shortened stem, leaf lettuce leaf number is large and large, to leaf or leaf ball for food, stem lettuce with the vigorous growth of the plant, the shortened stem gradually lengthened and enlarged, flower buds differentiation, the stem and leaves to continue to expand, the formation of stout fleshy stems. Lettuce heads with yellow flowers, about 20 flowers per inflorescence, are self-pollinated and sometimes cross-pollinated. Achenes, fruits brown or silvery white, with crown hairs.
Varieties: leaf lettuce and stem lettuce, leaf lettuce is divided into long leaf lettuce, wrinkled leaf lettuce, ball lettuce
The Compendium of Materia Medica says: "Lettuce, February under the seeds, the most suitable for the fertile ground, the leaves are like white chicory and pointed, the color is a little bit green, folded with white juice sticky hands, April sprouting, three or four feet high, peeled and eaten raw, the taste of the huqua, eaten badly is also good. lettuce, there have been in ancient times.
Family eating method: 1. buy and sell thin stem lettuce, the stem diagonally cut into thin slices, stir-fried in a frying pan, slightly add salt and a little drum oil, eat by the heat, the taste is very clear and refined. 2. lettuce leaves chopped, and tofu cooked with a special flavor. 3. lettuce shoots stem, the first sliced, and then cut into thin filaments, and bamboo shoots silk with the frying. 4. will be bamboo shoots boiled and cut into shreds, and high lettuce silk, with soy sauce and sesame oil mixed food, flavor more 5. Lettuce shoot stems, cut diagonal pieces, immersed in drum oil, as a send porridge dishes.
Eating lettuce shoots, to eat the main stem, many people will abandon the leaves, in fact, the leaves are also the most refreshing lettuce. Westerners often with it in the cold dishes. Nutritionists lettuce shoots as anemia patients the best food. Li Shizhen also said: "lettuce, through the meridians, open the chest and diaphragm. So lettuce shoots, not only is a good vegetable, but also has therapeutic effects.
Lettuce to stop abdominal pain: children's abdomen by the cold, or adults by the wind cold, abdominal pain. If you do not like to take medicine, then you can lettuce stems and leaves, mashed on the boiler after cooking, as a drink, can stop abdominal pain. Because lettuce shoots in the stem and leaves, there is a white milky liquid, called lettuce sub-piece, the English name for LACTUCAIUM. according to the pharmacologist's research, said that this liquid, analgesic and anesthesia effect, there is a new drug that is a component of the milky liquid.
LETTUCE STOPS TOOTH BLOOD: Where the body is weak, the yin is insufficient, bleeding between the teeth from time to time, or the nose is dry, easy to nosebleed. Can be used to lettuce stems sliced and boiled with soy sauce or salt, in order to treat and reduce the bleeding situation.
Because lettuce belongs to the aster family of leafy vegetables, rich in vitamin C, can prevent and treat scurvy, and kale, bitter melon, cauliflower, etc. is a necessary side food for human beings.
LETTUCE THROUGH LITTLE BREATH: When a child is inconvenient to urinate, lettuce stems and leaves can be used, mashed as mud, coated with the navel above the urine can gradually smooth, this method is contained in the health of a simple formula. There is a way to use dozens of stems of green onions, and lettuce stems ten stems together with the pounding, plus honey or glycerin into a mud cake, coated in the navel above the belly, but also to make the urine fluent. There is a key point when applying, that is, the mud cake of lettuce should be warmed up with hot water, and then coated, so as not to be cold. The location of the cloth, to leave the umbilicus, on the belly. Or use cotton or gauze to fill the umbilicus beforehand to prevent the liquid from soaking in, then it is more appropriate.