What’s licorice?

Licorice (scientific name: Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch) alias: Guo Lao, sweet grass, Ural licorice, sweet root seeds. Leguminosae, licorice genus perennial herbs, roots and rhizomes thick, is a kind of tonic herbal medicine. It mostly grows in arid and semi-arid desert steppe, desert edge and loess hilly area. Roots and rhizomes for medicinal use.

Pharmacopoeia records

This product is the dried roots and rhizomes of the leguminous plant Glycyrrhiza uralensis Fisch., Glycyrrhiza inflata Bat. or Glycyrrhiza glabra L.. Harvested in spring and fall, remove the roots and dry in the sun.

Traits:

Glycyrrhiza glabra: the root is cylindrical, 25-100cm long, 0.6-3.5cm in diameter. the outer skin is loose and tight. The surface is reddish brown or grayish brown, with remarkable longitudinal wrinkles, grooves, lenticels and sparse fine root scars. The texture is solid, slightly fibrous in cross section, yellowish white, powdery, forming a layer with obvious rings, rays radial, some with fissures. The rhizome is cylindrical, with bud scars on the surface and a pith in the middle of the section. Slight gas, sweet and special flavor.

Swollen fruit licorice: roots and rhizomes woody and stout, some branched, rough outer skin, more gray-brown or gray-brown. The texture is hard, with many woody fibers and little powderiness. Rhizome adventitious buds are many and thick.

Photinia glycyrrhiza glabra: roots and rhizomes are firmer in texture, some branched, outer skin not rough, more gray-brown, lenticels are fine and inconspicuous.

Sexual flavor and attribution: sweet, flat. Attributes to the heart, lung, spleen and stomach meridians.

Functions and Indications: Nourishing the spleen and benefiting the qi, clearing heat and removing toxins, expelling phlegm and relieving cough, easing the pain and harmonizing various medicines. It is used for weak spleen and stomach, tiredness and fatigue, palpitation and shortness of breath, cough and phlegm, contracted pain in the epigastrium, abdomen and limbs, carbuncle, swelling and sores, relieving toxicity and potency of drugs.

Usage and dosage: 2-10g.

Storage: Place in ventilated dry place, prevent moth.

Applications of Licorice

Medicinal Use:

Licorice is a commonly used bulk medicinal herb, medicinal and food varieties, ranked in the forefront of all medicines, is the most commonly used clinical drugs. Raw licorice can clear heat and remove toxins, moisten the lungs and relieve cough, and harmonize the properties of all medicines; roasted licorice can replenish the spleen and benefit the qi, with a large clinical dosage and a large export volume.

In addition to being used as traditional medicinal herbs and modern pharmaceutical raw materials, licorice can also be used as a sweetener in candies, beverages and cigarettes, and as a whitening agent in cosmetics.

Edible:

Licorice is also widely used in the food industry to refine candies, preserves and chewing gum.

Licorice contains about 7% to 27% glycyrrhizic acid. Glycyrrhizic acid, also known as glycyrrhizin sweetener, is a highly effective triterpenoid saponin sweetener that is about 50 times sweeter than sucrose. As a sweetener, ammonium glycyrrhizinate is mainly used in candied cold fruits, candies, cookies, canned meat, condiments and beverages.