Wild vegetables: eating more of them benefits women in many ways, they fortify the stomach and aid digestion, and they are commonly used in gynecology to treat irregular menstruation

Houttuynia cordata (fish mint) is pungent in taste, cold and cooling in nature, and enters the lung meridian. It can clear heat and detoxify, reduce swelling and heal sores, promote urination and remove dampness, clear heat and stop dysentery, and fortify the stomach and aid digestion. It is used to treat lung abscess, sores and swollen toxins, hemorrhoids with bloody stool, and accumulated heat in the spleen and stomach caused by excess heat, heat toxin, damp pathogen, and acute heat, etc. Modern pharmacological experiments show that this product has antibacterial, antiviral, immunity-enhancing, and diuretic effects. Houttuynia cordata has a particularly strong anti-inflammatory and antiviral capacity, and has antibacterial and anti-inflammatory effects against Haemophilus influenzae, pneumonia, skin inflammation, etc., making it a natural antibiotic. It is contraindicated in deficiency-cold patterns and negative-type external sores.

Wormwood (Artemisia argyi) has a close relationship with the lives of Chinese people. Every year at the Dragon Boat Festival, people always place wormwood in their homes to "ward off evil"; the dried plant is soaked in water and steamed to achieve disinfection and relieve itching, and postpartum women often bathe or steam with wormwood water. The whole plant is used as medicine, and has effects such as warming the meridians, removing dampness, dispelling cold, stopping bleeding, reducing inflammation, relieving asthma, relieving cough, preventing miscarriage, and resisting allergies. Medical texts through the ages record it as an "essential medicine for stopping bleeding," and it is also one of the commonly used medicines in gynecology, being especially good for treating deficiency-cold gynecological disorders. It also treats chronic bronchitis and asthma in the elderly; when boiled in water for bathing, it can prevent and treat maternal and infant infections during the puerperium, or it can be made into medicinal pillows and medicinal vests to prevent and treat chronic bronchitis or asthma in the elderly and deficiency-cold stomach pain, etc.; the dried and mashed leaves yield "moxa floss," which is made into moxa sticks for moxibustion and can also serve as a raw material for "seal ink paste." In addition, the whole plant is used as an insecticidal pesticide or burned as smoke for room disinfection and insecticide. The tender buds and seedlings are used as vegetables.

Wormwood has the effects of regulating menstruation and stopping bleeding, preventing miscarriage and stopping flooding, and dispelling cold and removing dampness. It treats irregular menstruation, menstrual pain and abdominal pain, miscarriage, and uterine bleeding, and its roots treat rheumatoid arthritis, head wind, and postpartum wind, etc. Because it can shape ice into round forms and can moxa-treat a hundred diseases, it is the most commonly used medicine by physicians. Modern experimental research proves that mugwort leaf has antibacterial and antiviral effects; asthma-relieving, cough-suppressing, and phlegm-expelling effects; bleeding-stopping and anticoagulant effects; sedative and anti-allergic effects; and liver-protecting and bile-promoting effects, etc. Wormwood can be used in recipes such as "mugwort leaf tea," "mugwort leaf soup," and "mugwort leaf porridge" to enhance the body's resistance to disease. Wormwood has a special fragrance, and this special fragrance has the effect of repelling mosquitoes and insects, so the ancients often hung wormwood in front of their doors, first to ward off evil and second to drive away mosquitoes and insects.

There are mainly three kinds of alfalfa produced in China. Its nutritional value is very high, and it has the effects of clearing the spleen and stomach, promoting the large and small intestines, and expelling bladder stones. Alfalfa contains the richest vitamin K, with a content so high that it surpasses all vegetables. It is also quite rich in vitamin C and B vitamins. Alfalfa is a cooling vegetable, and after eating it, it can indeed clear internal heat, especially in dry and hot seasons, where using it as a side dish has remarkable effects, even better than watercress. After alfalfa is stir-fried in oil, eating it while hot gives an extremely fresh and clean taste. After it cools, it still tastes good to eat, and its juice gives a feeling of refreshing the heart and spleen. In dry and hot seasons, if you feel dry lips and tongue, using it as a side dish is a top-grade dish for maintaining health.