Hawthorn is a drupe fruit with hard core, thin pulp and slightly sour taste. It contains almost all the nutrients of fruit, and the content of 18 amino acid, especially vitamin C, is high, reaching 89 grams, which is 17 times higher than that of apple and 30 times higher than that of pear. Its main components are: maslinic acid, flavonoids and vitamin C. The fruit can be eaten raw or made into preserved fruit cakes, dried and used as medicine. It is a unique medicinal and fruit tree species in China. Its main functions are: invigorating stomach, promoting digestion, reducing weight, lowering blood fat, lowering blood pressure, preventing aging and enhancing immunity. At the same time, it is also a good medicine for invigorating spleen, appetizing, promoting digestion, promoting blood circulation and resolving phlegm, and has a good effect on chest diaphragm, spleen fullness, hernia, blood stasis and amenorrhea. Vitexin, a flavonoid in hawthorn, is a kind of drug with strong anticancer effect, and its extract has certain inhibitory effect on the growth, proliferation, infiltration and metastasis of cancer cells in vivo. According to "Compendium of Materia Medica", hawthorn can help digestion, eliminate stagnation, resolve phlegm, swallow acid, remove blood stasis and relieve pain. According to Hong Zhaoguang's "food is the best medicine", hawthorn has many nutritional and medical values. Eating hawthorn products often can stimulate appetite, help digestion, prevent atherosclerosis and prolong life, so hawthorn is regarded as "longevity food". Professor of China University of Science and Technology determined the carbon 14 dating of the residue on the pottery fragments of Jiahu site in Henan province 8600 years ago, and confirmed that hawthorn was the earliest fruit to drink. "Song Yue Literature" contains: During the period of the Yellow Emperor 5000 years ago, the Laojun Cave in Songshan used hawthorn to make wine.
Classification of hawthorn varieties
Hawthorn is divided into sweet and sour according to taste. Sweet hawthorn is pink in appearance, small in size, smooth in surface and slightly sweet to eat. There are several varieties of sour hawthorn, namely crooked red, big Venus, big cotton ball and ordinary hawthorn (the earliest hawthorn variety).
The crooked handle is red, as the name implies, slightly protruding at the fruit handle, which looks crooked, hence the name. The single fruit of red hawthorn with curved handle is bigger than that of common hawthorn.
Great Venus, the single fruit is bigger than the crooked red fruit, and the number of ripeness is less, so it is named Great Venus. It has the strongest taste and belongs to a special acid.
Big cotton ball, the largest single fruit, has soft taste and moderate acidity when it is ripe, and it is basically unprocessed when eaten, with short shelf life.
Common hawthorn, the earliest variety of hawthorn, is small in size and hard in flesh, which is suitable for medicine and is the main raw material of canned hawthorn in the market.
Traditional Chinese medicine value
Sexual taste
Sour, sweet, slightly warm.
Meridian tropism
Enter spleen, stomach and liver meridians.
efficacy
Digestion promoting, stomach invigorating, qi promoting, blood stasis removing, turbidity removing and lipid lowering.
therapy
It can be used for treating meat stagnation, epigastric fullness, diarrhea, abdominal pain, blood stasis, amenorrhea, postpartum blood stasis, stabbing pain in the heart, chest pain, hernia pain and hyperlipidemia. And the digestion promoting and stagnation guiding functions of the burnt hawthorn are enhanced. Used for meat stagnation and diarrhea.
Hawthorn has important medicinal value. Since ancient times, it has become a good medicine for invigorating spleen and appetizing, resolving food stagnation, promoting blood circulation and resolving phlegm, such as hawthorn pill and Jiao Sanxian. Ancient medical scientists in China have long attached importance to the softening, hardness and digestion of hawthorn. When cooking old chicken hard meat, adding a few hawthorns is easy to rot, which shows that it has the function of eliminating meat. Hawthorn is the main component of Gaolanxian, Baohe Pill and hawthorn pill. Hawthorn also has the functions of removing silt, stopping bleeding, preventing heatstroke and refreshing.
Western medicine value
Because hawthorn contains a variety of organic acids, such as maslinic acid, it tastes sour and sweet, and contains lipolytic enzymes, which can enhance the role of enzymes, promote the digestion of meat and contribute to the transformation of cholesterol. Therefore, for people who feel full after eating meat or greasy things, eating hawthorn, hawthorn slices, hawthorn water or hawthorn pill can help digestion and is a key food for the elderly. Hawthorn can also benefit gallbladder and promote gastric juice secretion. Because hawthorn is rich in a variety of organic acids, it can keep vitamin C in hawthorn and will not be destroyed even under heating. Therefore, vitamin C can still be preserved after being made into hawthorn cakes and other products. Hawthorn is also rich in triterpenoids such as carotene, calcium, oleanolic acid, ornithine, crataegin and other beneficial components (flavonoids, multiflavonoids, trimelliflavane, tannins and other chemical components), which can relax blood vessels, strengthen and regulate myocardium, increase the range of ventricular and cardiac motion and coronary blood flow, and reduce serum cholesterol and blood pressure; In addition, hawthorn also has an auxiliary treatment effect on heart activity dysfunction, vascular neurosis, fibrous arrhythmia and other diseases; Mountain plants also contain quercitrin, which has the functions of dilating blood vessels, promoting tracheal cilia movement, eliminating phlegm and relieving asthma, so hawthorn is an ideal health food for preventing and treating cardiovascular diseases, and also a food with good curative effect.
hawthorn wine
Hawthorn wine is delicate, elegant, mellow, crystal clear, retains the natural fruity aroma, slightly astringent, and is a high-quality beverage wine. The alcohol content is 1.5, 12, 13, 36, 52, etc. Li Shizhen, a famous medical scientist in the Ming Dynasty, said: "Red fruit tastes sour, sweet and slightly warm." It can "sober up, eliminate meat, break blood stasis, dissipate stagnation, relieve bloating, relieve hangover, resolve phlegm, eliminate malnutrition and stop diarrhea." Therefore, the wine has the effects of resolving phlegm and benefiting qi, resolving food stagnation, lowering blood pressure and promoting blood circulation, invigorating stomach and strengthening spleen. In addition, the wine is mild and adaptable, and can be drunk by both men and women.
Common classification methods in hawthorn wine:
1, homemade:
Production method: Wash hawthorn, remove the core, mash it, put it in a beaker, add sugar and mix well, cover it and put it in a warm place. Stir frequently, ferment for 1~2 months to obtain hawthorn wine, press with gauze, remove residue and filter to obtain hawthorn wine.
Efficacy and indications: promoting blood circulation, benefiting qi and strengthening spleen. This wine has obvious effects on restoring physical fatigue, increasing energy and promoting appetite.
Dosage: 1 small cup twice a day.
2, bubble wine:
Many people like to brew their own wine, such as bayberry wine, wine, litchi wine, angelica wine and so on. One of the advantages of homemade wine is that the purity of the wine is absolutely enough, there will be no water mixing, and of course the taste is better. I'll teach you how to do it, hawthorn wine.
① Soak the hawthorn in salt water a little, then wash it, remove the handle, dig the pedicle and dry it thoroughly.
(2) Put the processed hawthorn and rock sugar into a clean water-free and oil-free glass sealed jar, and pour in the wine. Don't use plastic. It doesn't matter if it's not sealed. Just cover the bottle cap.
③ Store in a dry place away from light. If there is turbidity or pulp loss, it is suggested that the hawthorn be fished out after 1 month, filtered and then stored.
(4) When the color of hawthorn is dissolved in the wine, you can start drinking. But it will taste better if it is put for about 3 months to half a year.
⑤ Wine with a temperature above 35 degrees can be preserved for one or two years at room temperature. If the degree of wine is low, it is recommended to put it in the refrigerator after the color of wine turns red.
Matters needing attention
When you make your own wine, there are many places to pay attention to. After all, every time you make wine, at least one catty of white wine should be used as the base wine. In order to avoid waste, we still need to be careful step by step in the process of brewing to avoid failure. So, what are the precautions for homemade hawthorn wine?
① Wash and dry the fruit, and be sure to dry it. Why? Because too much water will dilute the degree of wine and affect the taste of wine, just like adding water.
(2) Lemon slices with peeled and white meridians can be added to increase flavor. You can also put half a vanilla pod or cinnamon stick.
③ It is best to choose wine brewed with colorless and transparent grains, such as sorghum wine and Erguotou.