Ruly Bookshelf: Grow Your Own Drugs
Intrigued by the title of this month’s Ruly Bookshelf choice? I certainly was. After hearing about this book on NPR, I had to read it. The book’s topic was also a great way to do both a Ruly Bookshelf and a Ruly Survival post in one.
If you think that gardening is an old person’s hobby, I would like you to meet the rock star of gardening, James Wong! Mr. Wong is a self-described “ethnobotanist.” As a young boy, he grew up in Malaysia watching his grandmother prepare various plant-based remedies. He went on to obtain a Master’s degree in botany, where he studied the plant-harvesting strategies of indigenous women in rural Ecuador. He trained at the Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew. He created an award-winning landscape design company, Amphibian Designs. He’s young. He’s handsome. He’s wickedly smart. It’s no wonder that someone thought he would do well on TV and he has hosted the show “Grow Your Own Drugs” on the BBC.
The book, “Grow Your Own Drugs” is based on the television show. It is beautifully produced with gorgeous pictures and quick-reading text. There are a few brief introductory sections but most of the book reads like a cookbook with recipes for teas, salves, soups, soaps and even hot chocolate! Each recipe has a medicinal aspect, incorporating plants known to have health-enhancing properties. There is an index at the back with the “top 100 medicinal plants” which gives a quick overview of each plant, its medicinal aspects and suggestions for how to use it.
“[P]erhaps the most exciting news for horticultural novices is that medicinal herbs are normally the easiest of plants to grow. In fact, many are actually invasive weeds in their country of origin. . . .”
–James Wong, Grow Your Own Drugs
Anyone who writes a book about medicinal plants, particularly for an American audience, is likely to face criticism that the book is anti-medicine. Mr. Wong is not attacking doctors and hospitals. His plant remedies are not a substitute for prescription drugs and medical treatments but rather supplements to naturally enhance health.
“Indeed, the natural origins behind major drugs such as aspirin, morphine, penicillin and even contraceptive pills reveal that ‘natural’ medicine is not as separate from ‘conventional’ medicine as it is popularly conceived to be. In fact, the World Health Organization estimates that up to 80 percent of the world’s population relies on plant-based medicine as the key form of health care and actively promotes its use.
–James Wong, Grow Your Own Drugs
Artichokes, for example, are known to have cholesterol-lowering properties and one of the recipes in the book is for a fruit leather made from hawthorn berries and artichokes. (You can get the recipe here from the BBC’s website.) There are many fun “cosmeceutical” recipes too, adding some medicinal aspects to cosmetic therapies, like face scrubs and even deodorant!
Some may also worry that these recipes and instructions will take too much time to make. Some are a bit involved but most are quick. Take for example this “recipe” for a bath oil made from dandelions:
Dandelion Flower Bath Oil
Pick enough fresh flowerheads to fill a small Mason jar. Pour olive oil over to cover, pushing a knife around inside to get rid of any air pockets. Cover and leave on a sunny windowsill for 2 weeks, or until the flowers have lost their color. Strain, then pour into a sterilized bottle.–James Wong, Grow Your Own Drugs
You are sure to learn something new about plants from reading this book as well. Two of the plants that stuck with me are eyebright and marshmallow.
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“The flowers of eyebright are extremely striking . . . In fact, they look rather like eyes. From the sixteenth century onward, the idea that a plant’s appearance offered clues to its medicinal use was very popular–a concept called the Doctrine of Signatures. . . . There has been little research regarding eyebright’s efficacy, but one recent study showed positive results for use in the treatment of conjunctivitis.”
–James Wong, Grow Your Own Drugs |
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Marshmallow (which I never knew was actually a plant) was used to make the first marshmallow candies. Since the process of making a marshmallow was so labor intensive, chefs eventually figured out how to use egg whites, gelatin and corn starch to create the same texture. |
What I like the most about this book is that it puts a new spin on gardening and transforms growing plants into a “cool” activity for a new generation.
“I was brought up to see plants as solutions in life rather than as just a pretty backdrop to it.”
–James Wong, Grow Your Own Drugs
I hope that you take the opportunity to read this wonderful book. You are sure to come away with a deeper appreciation of plants for the experience.
I leave you with a YouTube clip of James Wong in action on his BBC show. From the way he dices the vegetables at the end of the clip, I wonder if he has also trained as a chef!
Are you willing to consider plant-based therapies to improve your health? Do you currently use any plant-based therapies? Please share in the comments.