Scottish Thistle

There is a book I have been reading called Healing Threads by Mary Beith.


In there she mentions the old uses for thistle - a sweet for children and a tea for melancholy.

So we set about researching it and looking at the varieties we have growing near us.

There are several kinds of thistle that grow world wide.  Looking at the flowerhead, leaves and stem give you a good idea of which one you have.  The Scottish Thistle has a very different flower head.

There is little to no info on the culinary / medicinal value of Scottish Thistle.

We did find this site though that echo's the info by Mary Beith.


http://scienceray.com/biology/botany/thistle-do-nicely/

Extract:  Once upon a time, tea was brewed from the mighty thistle. It was said that it was a good cure for depression and everyone knows that in time past depression was surely a good part of the Scottish psyche. If the thought of thistle tea puts you off then I can only imagine at how you would feel about the children eating the bulbous head of the thistle – rumour has it that it tastes chewy and sweet.


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Personally I think its very useful culturally to investigate the thistle further and we will be doing this over a period of time.


Certainly with herbs its essential to correctly identify the plant as many look similar with toxic results.