Arctium lappa (Arctium lappa) belongs to the Asteraceae burdock genus, biennial herb, also known as Oriental ginseng, Dali Zi, etc., is a traditional Chinese medicine and food plants, in Europe, North America also has hundreds of years of history of medicinal use of burdock.

With the in-depth study of burdock at home and abroad in recent years, found that burdock roots, stems, leaves, seeds have special health effects, burdock as a rare vegetable by more and more consumers, safe, convenient, nutritious, health care burdock food demand is also increasing. In this paper, the developed burdock food is summarized, but also its future development to make prospects for the future development of burdock health food to provide a certain basis.

Health effects in burdock

Burdock is rich in nutrients, is a typical high-protein low-fat vegetables, rich in fiber, minerals, vitamins, etc. (attached). China’s “Dictionary of Modern Chinese Medicine” and other national authoritative pharmacopoeia of burdock’s physiological role is summarized in three aspects: ① has the role of growth promotion; ② inhibit the growth of tumors; ③ antibacterial and antifungal effects.

1. Antibacterial and antimicrobial
Lou Zaixiang, Yang Lifen and others showed that chlorogenic acid and other substances in burdock can effectively inhibit the growth of Escherichia coli and Staphylococcus aureus, which are commonly found in food; Ya-Chen Wu, H sueh-Chiao Liu and others found that burdock oral liquid has the effect of inhibiting Helicobacter pylori; Jonatas Rafael de Oliveira et al. also found that burdock extract has an inhibitory effect on oral microorganisms; Rieman Mary T et al. found that burdock leaves can promote the healing of burn wounds; Elena Pomari et al. The above studies fully demonstrated that burdock has antibacterial and antimicrobial effects, which provides a basis for burdock as antibacterial and antimicrobial type of health food.

2. Cleansing and laxative
The Compendium of Materia Medica” records that burdock “through the twelve meridians, wash the five viscera and rise, served for a long time to lighten the body and resistance to old age”; Zhao Jianbo and other research shows that burdock root extract has the effect of intestinal laxative.

3. Treatment of nephritis and aphrodisiac
Traditional Chinese medicine uses burdock root as an aphrodisiac to treat impotence, and Americans also believe that burdock root can promote sexual desire. Cao Jianfeng used rat test showed that burdock root extract has the effect of treating nephritis and aphrodisiac.

4. Lowering blood sugar and blood fat
Feng Qiyan and Xu Yijun found that burdock tea has the effect of assisting in lowering blood sugar and blood lipids. Therefore, burdock can be made into health food that can lower blood sugar and blood fat.

5. Anti-tumor
Song Chunqing and others found that burdock has anti-tumor and immune activity of burdock sapogenins, Li Xiaoqing, Lu Ming and other research proved that burdock sapogenins in burdock can inhibit prostate cancer, liver cancer, esophageal cancer, gastric cancer, colon cancer cancer cancer rate.

Burdock health food development status

1. Health tea and beverage
Burdock tea as a traditional health care products, the use of a long history, modern scholars Xu Yijun, Feng Qiyan and other scholars through the burdock tea rat test found that burdock tea has aided in lowering the role of blood lipids, so the study of burdock tea once became a hot spot. Song Hui and other burdock as the main raw material, cassia seeds, honeysuckle and other auxiliary materials, the development of burdock herbal tea; Chen Maoguang studied the burdock and wolfberry drink, are roasted burdock slices of the water extract, the use of hot water as a medium to dissolve the active ingredients of burdock, and then compounded with other auxiliaries, blended into a health care tea of different flavors.

2.2 Burdock fermented products
According to the research, inulin in burdock has the ability to promote the proliferation of bifidobacteria and lactobacilli in the body, and can also effectively inhibit the growth of Escherichia coli, Salmonella, and Clostridium difficile. Therefore, burdock can not only improve the health effect of the product, but also prevent the growth of stray bacteria by adding burdock into the fermented products.

What’s more, when using burdock to make fermented products, the content of burdock’s active ingredients (inulin, chlorogenic acid, burdock sapogenins, etc.) in the product is higher than that of pure water extract. Fermented products that have been developed include burdock yogurt, burdock vinegar drink, and burdock beer.

2.2.1 Vinegar drink
Wei Dong developed aloe vera juice burdock vinegar drink the best formula for burdock vinegar 12%, aloe vera juice 10%, rock sugar 6%, citric acid 0.2%, and clear burdock vinegar drink blood lipid-lowering function; Ma Zhongming also through the one-way test, orthogonal test developed burdock grape health vinegar drink, the processing technology is as follows: burdock powder, corn flour, bran (1: 1: 1) a mixture of wetting a steaming a sugaring A sugar adjustment (16 ~ 17 ° Bx, pH 3.5 ~ 4.0) an alcoholic fermentation (30 ℃, 4d) an acetic acid fermentation (add the same amount of grape pomace 34 ℃, 5d) a rough filtration a blend (original vinegar: sucrose: citric acid 12%: 9%: O.1%) a fine filtration a sterilization a filling a finished product.

2.2.2 Yogurt products
Wei Dong, Sun Ke, etc. also studied the production process of burdock yogurt, the production process is not very different, are burdock water extracts, added to cow’s milk after fermentation of the product, a single product category, the future direction of development of burdock yogurt can be with other grains, fruits and common compounding to get the texture and flavor of the series of products is very different.

2.2.3 Health Beer
At present, the only burdock fermented alcoholic beverage developed is beer, and in the future, it can also be developed in the direction of white wine, yellow wine, and composite fruit wines, such as burdock wine, burdock jujube wine, and burdock apple wine. Zhao Yuqiao and Sun Ke have respectively studied the beer with burdock as the auxiliary material, and the additions are burdock crude extract.

2.3 Canned burdock
Canned products are easy to use, long shelf life, and diverse flavors, making fresh burdock into cans is an important direction of burdock processing. Currently, canned burdock products available on the market include burdock sauce with a variety of flavors (adding tempeh, hot sauce, meat, etc.). Cui Dongbo used burdock, shiitake mushrooms and pork as the main raw materials, and determined the best recipe for burdock and shiitake mushroom meat sauce through orthogonal testing. In addition to this burdock can also be compounded with a variety of meat and vegetables, such as chicken, radish, etc., to produce a variety of flavors of food, and burdock can also be made into a separate brine canned goods to meet different consumer needs.

2.4 Dried Burdock Fruit
The research and development of dried burdock fruit also points out a direction for the diversification of burdock health products. A single burdock as raw material may not be highly accepted by consumers, but in the future, it can be compounded with jujubes, goji berries, apples, etc. to make sugar products with diversified flavors and colors, which will be more popular.

2.5 Other burdock products
At present, the domestic production of burdock products are mainly concentrated in Xuzhou, Jiangsu Province and Shandong Linyi, mainly to simple processing of burdock tea, burdock slices, burdock vegetable soup, burdock sauce, etc., deep-processed products less.

Japan has a wide range of burdock products, not only tea, slices, canned food, etc., but also the dietary fiber in the burdock to put forward, made of weight-loss products, in addition to the burdock made of ultra-fine powder, not only to reduce the waste material, but also can be conveniently added to a variety of other foods, to further expand the scope of application of the burdock, but this product is still a blank in the country.

Discussion

Burdock leaves, stems, roots, seeds, etc. have functional effects, and in recent years the extraction of functional ingredients from burdock has become a research hotspot, and consumer awareness is deepening. At present, burdock series products have the following problems:

① primary products and less variety, mainly tea, tablets, canned, fermented products are mainly yogurt, vinegar, alcohol only beer; puffed food, pasta, pastries, sugar products and other relatively few;

② processing raw materials are mostly burdock root, leaves, stems, skins, etc. are mostly discarded, resulting in waste. According to research burdock leaves, stems, skin also contains a large number of health ingredients, such as chlorogenic acid in the leaves can effectively inhibit the growth of common microorganisms in the food, stems, skin also contains inulin, burdock glycosides and other functional ingredients, can also be used as raw materials for health food;

③ Poor independent research and development capability of technical equipment, few deep-processed products, low value-added, and poor international competitiveness of products.

Although there are great prospects for development, but burdock health food development is a long way to go, but also need government support, in-depth research, in order to develop a diversified health food to meet consumer demand.