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 Gorgon
Fruit
Euryale ferox, QIAN SHI
The gorgon fruit, qian shi, is also called ji tou mi (hen's head food)
and ji tou zi (hen's head). It is an annual and a water plant, covered with
many thorns. The fruit is purple-red in color, covered with a dense layer of
fine thorns, and its shape slightly resembles a hen's head, hence the names.
Inside are round seeds with a black shell and inside these the kernel. The
outside of the kernel is a dusty red-brown, inside the flesh is pink-white.
It has a faint fragrance and an insipid, slightly sweet, astringent flavor.
It is harvested in early autumn. Its nature is neither hot nor cold.
The fruit can benefit the spleen, helps stop diarrhea, is astringent and
helps stop nocturnal emission. The kernel contains a lot of starch,
carbohydrate, protein, oil, calcium, phosphorous, iron, vitamins B1, B2, C,
nicotinic acid, carotene, etc.
APPLICATIONS
1. WEAK STOMACH AND SPLEEN LEADING TO FREQUENT ATTACKS OF DIARRHEA. Take 30
grams of gorgon fruit in powdered form (see below) plus an appropriate
amount of sugar. Mix together, cover with water and boil till reduced to a
paste. Take this 3 times a day for 10 days.
2. SEMINAL EMISSION; INVOLUNTARY EMISSION, SPERMATORRHOEA. Take 30 grams of
fruit and stir-fry until it is scorched yellow. Add 30 grams of oysters and
water and simmer into a soup. Drink this daily both in the morning and the
evening.
3. INCONTINENCE; EXCESSIVE URINE. Take 30 grams of fruit and stir-fry till
yellow. Add 30 grams of rice wine* and some water and simmer. Drink this
every evening before bed.
(*Japanese sake can be used. Ed.)
4. LEUCORRHOEA. Take 30 grams of fruit and stir-fry till yellow, 12 grams of
crushed cuttlefish bone and 6 grams of ginkgo kernels. Add water and steam
till cooked. Eat this daily.
PREPARATIONS 1. Obtain the seeds and
wash clean, then dry in the sun. Break open, discard the hard shell and
obtain the kernel. This is what is used in traditional medicine. 2. GORGON
FRUIT POWDER. Take 500 grams of shelled fruit and 500 grams of shelled lotus
seed. Stir-fry till yellow and grind to powder. Add 250 grams of lotus root
powder and mix the lot together. |
