What vegetable is potherb mustard? A step-by-step guide to pickling potherb mustard

Potherb mustard, also known as fragrant green vegetable and snow vegetable, is a common green vegetable in China. It is a new variety mutated from mustard. It is deeply loved by people for its good taste and high nutritional value. So what is potherb mustard? What pickling methods are there?

1. What is potherb mustard?

1. Potherb mustard is also called pai cai, shao cai and jiutou mustard. It is a new variety mutated from mustard. It is an annual herbaceous plant of the species mustard in the genus Brassica of the tribe Brassiceae of the family Brassicaceae. Its leaves are relatively large, and its stems and leaves are thick and strong, in a light green oval shape. It gets its name because some leaves turn red after frost. Its flowers are bright yellow.

2. Potherb mustard is a leafy vegetable in the mustard category, so it smells a bit spicy and tastes a little bitter. Therefore, it is mostly used to make pickles. Of course, it can also be boiled or stir-fried, but in daily life it is mostly made into pickles.

3. Potherb mustard is the tender stems and leaves of mustard, a plant in the family Brassicaceae. It contains rich vitamins, protein, calcium, phosphorus, iron and many other elements. Among them, every 100g of potherb mustard contains 2.8g protein, 1.6g vitamins, 2.39mg calcium and 64mg phosphorus. It has the effects of reducing swelling and relieving pain, promoting urination, dispelling wind and aiding digestion. Regular consumption can treat dysentery, coughing up blood, sore throat, difficult urination and other conditions. It is a common medicinal material among the people. If there is a bruise or joint pain, it can also be applied externally to the affected area, and a good therapeutic effect can be achieved.

4. Potherb mustard is cold-resistant, so it is relatively common in the north. Of course, it also exists in the south, but its leaves rarely turn purplish red, so it is mistakenly called “xuelihong”. It is also often eaten as a pickle, and after pickling, potherb mustard can not only be stir-fried, but also used as filling, made into meigan cai and so on. It can be said that there are many ways to eat it, and it is currently quite famous in Ningbo.

2. What pickling methods are there for potherb mustard?

Because potherb mustard is a mutated variety of mustard and tastes a little bitter, many people like to make it into pickles. Not only is the taste good, but it can also be stored for a long time. Let us take a look below at the specific method for pickling potherb mustard:

Ingredients needed: potherb mustard, salt, Sichuan pepper.

Specific pickling steps for potherb mustard:

Step 1. Pick some mature potherb mustard from the vegetable field, then trim and wash it clean, hang it on a rope and sun it for a day. When the leaves are slightly wilted, take it out and prepare to pickle it. When choosing potherb mustard, try not to choose ones that are too tender or too old, so that the too tender ones do not pickle well and the too old ones do not taste good after pickling. At the same time, when sunning it, do not dry it too much, so that the pickled result is not crisp and not tasty.

Step 2. Put the sun-dried potherb mustard into a large basin, then sprinkle in an appropriate amount of salt, and rub it hard with your hands so that the salt fully penetrates into the vegetable. Generally, for every jin of potherb mustard, putting in 250g of table salt is best. If too much or too little is put in, it will affect the taste.

Step 3. Wash the pickling jar clean, wipe dry the moisture inside, then put the prepared potherb mustard into the jar layer by layer or bundle by bundle. Finally, evenly sprinkle an appropriate amount of salt and Sichuan pepper on top, pour in salt water to submerge the potherb mustard, cover with the pickling lid and place it in a cool environment. By the next day, place a stone slab on top of the pickles. What needs attention here is that when placing the stone slab, it must not be placed on the same day, so as to avoid the stone slab pressing the vegetables too firmly, preventing the salt from penetrating into the vegetables and causing some of the pickled vegetables to be salty and some bland later.

Overall, potherb mustard is a mutated variety of mustard. It can not only be eaten as a vegetable, but also has relatively high medicinal value. Regular consumption can promote urination, aid digestion and so on. At present, many people like to use it to make pickles, and there are many ways to eat it. If you do not know how to pickle it, you can make it according to the three detailed steps above.