Essential aromatics from plants

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Essential aromatics from plants
dogmouth.net/photos/thailand/doi-suthep/
www.buiga.com/images/vanilla20Beans.jpg
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Cloves

• Chinese breath sweetener
• Used in many food, drugs, cigarettes
• Myrtaceae
• Spice Islands
• Dutch destroyed many plantations to drive up the
  price (1700s)
• Unopened flower buds

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Active ingredients from cloves

• Clove oil contains..
• Eugenol
• mixed with zinc oxide and used for dental cement
• derivatives used as analgesics, a variety of
  other things
• can be used to make vanilla
• Methyleugenol is carcinogenic
• Found in many spices
• Eliminated quickly from the body?

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Cinnamon

• Cinnomomum verum (zeylandicum)
• True cinnamon
• Native to Sri Lanka
• Lauraceae family
• Confusion with other Cinnamomum species
• C. cassia has a stronger flavor
• both can be called cinnamon in the US
• C. camphora used for camphor

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• Trees are coppiced to make lots of shoots

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• Bark is stripped only the inner bark is used

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Chemicals in cinnamon

• About 90 of the essential oil is cinnamaldehyde
• Eugenol, other compound also in cinnamon and
  cassia

eugenol
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Cinnamaldehyde

• Toxic in large quantities, not a carcinogen
• Can be used as an insecticide, fungicide
• Can be synthesized, but its cheaper to extract
  it from the bark

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Nutmeg tree

• Myristica fragrans in a family related to
  cinnamon, star anise (Magnoliales)
• Native to Indonesia
• Later than clovesreported from Constantinople by
  800 AD
• Portuguese controlled from 1514 until about 1600
• Dutch took over for two centuries
• French started a plantation in Mauritius in 1770

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Myristica fragrans

• A dioecious species
• Fruits dried and eaten locally
• Like dried ginger, also made into jam

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Nutmeg and mace

• From one plant
• Outer part of seed makes mace, inner part makes
  nutmeg (musky nut, Arabic mesk)
• Nutmeg aroma and flavor volatilizes quickly,
  hence the grater

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Constituents

• Essential oils (pressed from seed) used in a
  variety of cosmetics and foods, including
  Coca-cola (perhaps)
• Myristicin is the main odor-flavor compound
• Also found in parsley family
• A hallucinogen
• Used in insecticides, acaricides

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Mustard seed

• Several species, today mostly Sinapis alba (white
  or yellow mustard) and Brassica juncea (brown or
  Chinese mustard)
• Crucifer (mustard) family
• Cheapest of spices
• Ancient important European and Mediterranean
  spice
• Mustard powder not developed until 1720, made
  mustard only until then

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• Mustard taste comes from sulfur glycosides
  (sinigrin and sinalbin)
• When seed is broken, enzyme thioglycosidase
  breaks down the sulfur glycoside, releasing the
  sharp smelling sulfur compound
• Maximum taste in 10 minutes
• Heat or acid (vinegar) will preserve the flavor

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• Dijon mustard
• First commercial factory
• Brown mustard, juice of unripened grapes, wine
  vinegar
• English mustard
• Really hot, has spices and tumeric
• Chinese mustard
• Made from powder, lasts about an hour
• American mustard
• White mustard, its yellow because of tumeric,
  very mild

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Tumeric

• Curcuma longa, in the ginger family
• Long history in India
• Color and flavor
• Contains volatile oil curcumin
• Recent interest in medicinal use

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Horseradish

• Armoracia lapathifolia and A. rusticana
• Also old, European also in the mustard family
• Contains sinigrin, releases mustard oil-type
  compound when crushed

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Wasabi

• Eutrema wasabi (used to be called Wasabia
  japonica)
• Ground root
• Not related to horseradish, but it is a mustard

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• Also contains sulfur compounds

Wasabi farm in Japan
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How do these mustard oils work?

Jordt SE, Bautista DM, Chuang HH, McKemy DD,
Zygmunt PM, Hogestatt ED, Meng ID, Julius
D.Department of Cellular and Molecular
Pharmacology University of California, San
Francisco, California 94143-2140, USA.Wasabi,
horseradish and mustard owe their pungency to
isothiocyanate compounds. Topical application of
mustard oil (allyl isothiocyanate) to the skin
activates underlying sensory nerve endings,
thereby producing pain, inflammation and robust
hypersensitivity to thermal and mechanical
stimuli. Despite their widespread use in both the
kitchen and the laboratory, the molecular
mechanism through which isothiocyanates mediate
their effects remains unknown. Here we show that
mustard oil depolarizes a subpopulation of
primary sensory neurons that are also activated
by capsaicin, the pungent ingredient in chilli
peppers, and by Delta(9)-tetrahydrocannabinol
(THC), the psychoactive component of marijuana.
Both allyl isothiocyanate and THC mediate their
excitatory effects by activating ANKTM1, a member
of the TRP ion channel family recently implicated
in the detection of noxious cold. These findings
identify a cellular and molecular target for the
pungent action of mustard oils and support an
emerging role for TRP channels as ionotropic
cannabinoid receptors.
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Fennel

• Foeniculum vulgare
• Parsley family
• Called marathon in ancient Greek
• European, seed and stalk, three kinds!
• Sweet fennel most common for seed

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• Anethole is active ingredient
• Also found in anise, star anise
• Closely related to compounds found in tarragon
  and basil

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Star anise

• Tree called Illicium verum
• Primitive family, related to Magnoliaceae
• Not known in wild, assumed to be from China
• Mainly used in Chinese cooking
• Main commercial source of anethole

http//www.boga.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/html/Illicium_v
erum_Foto2.html
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Star anise

• Also a source of shikimic acid
• Used to make Tamiflu
• Shikimic acid can also be made by genetically
  engineered bacteria

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Allspice

• Pimenta dioica
• Called pimento in much of the world
• Dried unripe berry
• Still grown mainly in Jamaica
• Myrtle family (like cloves)
• Contains eugenol, some other components also
  found in cloves

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Allspice

• Never had the same importance as cinnamon and
  cloves
• Used in cooking
• Found in mens cosmetics

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Vanilla orchid

• Vanilla planifolia
• New world (Mexico)
• Wasnt commercial until artificial pollination
  discovered

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The other pepper

• Capsicum annuum and others
• Discovered by Columbus
• Important part of Mexican diet
• At least 9000 yrs old
• Many varieties
• Fruits very high in vitamin C
• Birds not sensitive
• Heat measure in Scoville units

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Capsaicin

• Interacts with a receptor called the vanilloid
  receptor subtype 1
• An ion channel receptor, provides sensitivity to
  heat, cold
• Not very volatile at all extremely stable Can be
  used as a pain reliever, for neuralgia, other
  types of pain

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Trigeminal nerve receptors

• Cranial nerves in tongue, oral cavity
• Respond to hot, cold, tingling
• Its a warning system
• Irritant sensation
• Detects pain messages meant to deter animals
• Ion channel receptor
• Why do we like to eat this stuff?

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Licorice

• Glycyrrhiza glabra
• Root of a legume
• Taste similar to anise seed and fennel
• Mediterranean plant, though there is an American
  relative

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• Active ingredient is glycyrrhizin
• Used as a flavoring agent in candies, drugs
• Much sweeter than sugar, but not used as a
  sweetener in US (can be used in Japan)
• Using too much can cause hypertension