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''Alpinia galanga'', a plant in the ginger family, bears a rhizome used largely as an herb in
Unani medicine Unani or Yunani medicine (Urdu: ''tibb yūnānī'') is Perso-Arabic traditional medicine as practiced in Muslim culture in South Asia and modern day Central Asia. Unani medicine is pseudoscientific. The Indian Medical Association describes U ...
and as a spice in
Arab cuisine Arab cuisine ( ar, المطبخ العربي) is the cuisine of the Arabs, defined as the various regional cuisines spanning the Arab world, from the Maghreb to the Fertile Crescent and the Arabian Peninsula. These cuisines are centuries old and ...
and Southeast Asian cookery. It is one of four plants known as " galangal". Its common names include greater galangal, lengkuas, and blue ginger.


Names

The name "galangal" is probably derived from
Persian Persian may refer to: * People and things from Iran, historically called ''Persia'' in the English language ** Persians, the majority ethnic group in Iran, not to be conflated with the Iranic peoples ** Persian language, an Iranian language of the ...
''qulanjan'' or
Arabic Arabic (, ' ; , ' or ) is a Semitic language spoken primarily across the Arab world.Semitic languages: an international handbook / edited by Stefan Weninger; in collaboration with Geoffrey Khan, Michael P. Streck, Janet C. E.Watson; Walte ...
''khalanjan'', which in turn may be an adaptation of Chinese ''gao liang jiang''. Its names in North India are derived from the same root, including ''kulanja'' in Sanskrit, ''kulanjan'' in Hindi, and ''kholinjan'' in Urdu. The name "lengkuas", on the other hand, is derived from Malay ''lengkuas'', which is derived from Proto-
Western Malayo-Polynesian The Western Malayo-Polynesian (WMP) languages, also known as the Hesperonesian languages, are a paraphyletic grouping of Austronesian languages that includes those Malayo-Polynesian languages that do not belong to the Central–Eastern Malayo-P ...
''*laŋkuas'', with cognates including Ilokano ''langkuás'';
Tagalog Tagalog may refer to: Language * Tagalog language, a language spoken in the Philippines ** Old Tagalog, an archaic form of the language ** Batangas Tagalog, a dialect of the language * Tagalog script, the writing system historically used for Taga ...
, Bikol, Kapampangan, Visayan, and
Manobo The Lumad are a group of Austronesian indigenous people in the southern Philippines. It is a Cebuano term meaning "native" or "indigenous". The term is short for Katawhang Lumad (Literally: "indigenous people"), the autonym officially adopt ...
''langkáuas'' or ''langkáwas''; Aklanon ''eangkawás''; Kadazan Dusun ''hongkuas'';
Ida'an The Ida'an (Idahan or Eraan or Sabahan) people are an ethnic group of Borneo, residing primarily in the Lahad Datu districts on the east coast of Sabah, Malaysia. Their current population is estimated to be around 6,000 (1987 estimate), but it ...
''lengkuas''; Ngaju Dayak ''langkuas''; and
Iban IBAN or Iban or Ibán may refer to: Banking * International Bank Account Number Ethnology * Iban culture * Iban language * Iban people Given name Cycling * Iban Iriondo (born 1984) * Iban Mayo (born 1977) * Iban Mayoz (born 1981) Football * ...
''engkuas''. Some of the names have become generalized and are also applied to other species of ''
Alpinia ''Alpinia'' is a genus of flowering plants in the ginger family, Zingiberaceae. It is named for Prospero Alpini, a 17th-century Italian botanist who specialized in exotic plants. Species are native to Asia, Australia, and the Pacific Islands, whe ...
'' as well as for ''
Curcuma zedoaria ''Curcuma zedoaria'' (zedoary, white turmeric, or temu putih) is a perennial herb and member of the genus '' Curcuma'', family Zingiberaceae. The plant is native to South Asia and Southeast Asia but is now naturalized in other places including ...
''. ''Alpinia galanga'' is also called ''laos'' in Javanese and ''laja'' in Sundanese. Other names include ''romdeng'' (រំដេង) in
Cambodia Cambodia (; also Kampuchea ; km, កម្ពុជា, UNGEGN: ), officially the Kingdom of Cambodia, is a country located in the southern portion of the Indochinese Peninsula in Southeast Asia, spanning an area of , bordered by Thailand ...
; ''pa de kaw'' (ပတဲကော) in Myanmar; ''kha'' in Thailand; ''nankyo'' in Japan; and ''hong dou kou'' in Mandarin Chinese. In
Tamil Tamil may refer to: * Tamils, an ethnic group native to India and some other parts of Asia ** Sri Lankan Tamils, Tamil people native to Sri Lanka also called ilankai tamils **Tamil Malaysians, Tamil people native to Malaysia * Tamil language, na ...
it is known as a "பேரரத்தை or பெரியரத்தை" ("Pae-reeya-ra-thai"), widely used in Siddha Medicine and in culinaries. In Sri Lanka it is known as ''Araththa'' (අරත්ත).


History of domestication

Lengkuas is native to Southeast Asia. Its original center of cultivation during the spice trade was Java, and today it is still cultivated extensively in Island Southeast Asia, most notably in the Greater Sunda Islands and the Philippines. Its cultivation has also spread into
Mainland Southeast Asia Mainland Southeast Asia, also known as the Indochinese Peninsula or Indochina, is the continental portion of Southeast Asia. It lies east of the Indian subcontinent and south of Mainland China and is bordered by the Indian Ocean to the west an ...
, most notably Thailand. Lengkuas is also the source of the leaves used to make ''nanel'' among the
Kavalan people The Kavalan (endonym ; "people living in the plain"; ) or Kuvalan are an indigenous people of Taiwan. Most of them moved to the coastal area of Hualien County and Taitung County in the 19th century due to encroachment by Han settlers. Their la ...
of Taiwan, a rolled leaf instrument used as a traditional children's toy common among Austronesian cultures.


Description

The plant grows from rhizomes in clumps of stiff stalks up to in height with abundant long leaves that bear red fruit. This plant's rhizome is the "galangal" used most often in cookery. It is valued for its use in food and
traditional medicine Traditional medicine (also known as indigenous medicine or folk medicine) comprises medical aspects of traditional knowledge that developed over generations within the folk beliefs of various societies, including indigenous peoples, before the ...
. The rhizome has a pungent smell and strong taste reminiscent of citrus,
black pepper Black pepper (''Piper nigrum'') is a flowering vine in the family Piperaceae, cultivated for its fruit, known as a peppercorn, which is usually dried and used as a spice and seasoning. The fruit is a drupe (stonefruit) which is about in diame ...
and pine needles. Red and white cultivars are often used differently, with red cultivars being primarily medicinal, and white cultivars primarily as a spice. The red fruit is used in traditional Chinese medicine and has a flavor similar to
cardamom Cardamom (), sometimes cardamon or cardamum, is a spice made from the seeds of several plants in the genera ''Elettaria'' and ''Amomum'' in the family Zingiberaceae. Both genera are native to the Indian subcontinent and Indonesia. They are re ...
.


Culinary uses

The rhizome is a common ingredient in
Thai curries Thai curry ( th, แกง, translit=kaeng, ) is a dish in Thai cuisine made from curry paste, coconut milk or water, meat, seafood, vegetables or fruit, and herbs. Curries in Thailand mainly differ from the curries in India in their use of ingr ...
and soups such as
tom kha kai ''Tom kha kai'', ''tom kha gai'', or Thai coconut soup ( th, ต้มข่าไก่, ; ) is a spicy and sour hot soup with coconut milk in Thai cuisine. Ingredients In Thailand, most ''tom kha kai'' recipes typically include coconut milk ...
, where it is used fresh in chunks or cut into thin slices, mashed and mixed into
curry paste Indian curry pastes in a UK supermarket Curry paste usually refers to a paste used as a cooking ingredient in the preparation of a curry. There are different varieties of curry paste depending from the region and also within the same cuisine: *In ...
.
Indonesian Indonesian is anything of, from, or related to Indonesia, an archipelagic country in Southeast Asia. It may refer to: * Indonesians, citizens of Indonesia ** Native Indonesians, diverse groups of local inhabitants of the archipelago ** Indonesian ...
''
rendang Rendang ( ; ) is a Minang dish originating from the Minangkabau region in West Sumatra, Indonesia. It has spread across Indonesian cuisine to the cuisines of neighbouring Southeast Asian countries such as Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei and ...
'' is usually spiced with galangal. It is also traditionally fermented with honey to produce the wine known as ''
byais ''Byais'' (also spelled ''bya-is'', ''biya-is'', or ''biyais''), is a traditional Filipino wine from the Mansaka people of Davao de Oro. It is made from boiled lengkuas (, , , or in Mansaka) mixed with honey or sugarcane juice which are then ...
'' among the
Mansaka people The Lumad are a group of Austronesian indigenous people in the southern Philippines. It is a Cebuano term meaning "native" or "indigenous". The term is short for Katawhang Lumad (Literally: "indigenous people"), the autonym officially adopt ...
of the Philippines.


Traditional medicine

Under the names 'chewing John', 'little John to chew', and 'court case root', it is used in
African American African Americans (also referred to as Black Americans and Afro-Americans) are an ethnic group consisting of Americans with partial or total ancestry from sub-Saharan Africa. The term "African American" generally denotes descendants of enslav ...
folk medicine Traditional medicine (also known as indigenous medicine or folk medicine) comprises medical aspects of traditional knowledge that developed over generations within the folk beliefs of various societies, including indigenous peoples, before the ...
and hoodoo
folk magic In religious studies and folkloristics, folk religion, popular religion, traditional religion or vernacular religion comprises various forms and expressions of religion that are distinct from the official doctrines and practices of organized rel ...
. In
Unani medicine Unani or Yunani medicine (Urdu: ''tibb yūnānī'') is Perso-Arabic traditional medicine as practiced in Muslim culture in South Asia and modern day Central Asia. Unani medicine is pseudoscientific. The Indian Medical Association describes U ...
'A.Galanga' is called as 'Khulanjan' and its actions and uses have been mentioned in many unani classical literatures like Al qanun fittib The Canon of Medicine, maghzanul mufradath etc. It is considered as Muqawwi qalb (cardiac tonic), mufarreh, munaffise balgam, muqawwi meda, muqawwi bah etc. Its used in
Asthma Asthma is a long-term inflammatory disease of the airways of the lungs. It is characterized by variable and recurring symptoms, reversible airflow obstruction, and easily triggered bronchospasms. Symptoms include episodes of wheezing, co ...
, cough, sore throat and other illnesses. Famous unani drug preparations with Khulanjan as an ingredient include Habb e Jadwar, Jawarish Jalinus, Jawarish Ood shirin etc. Ayurveda considers ''A. galanga'' (Sanskrit:-''rasna'') as a Vata Shamana drug. Known as பேரரத்தை (''perarathai'') in Tamil, this form of ginger is used with licorice root, called in Tamil ''athi-mathuram'' ('' Glycyrrhiza glabra'') as folk medicine for colds and sore throats.


Potential pharmacology

The rhizome has been shown to have weak
antimalarial Antimalarial medications or simply antimalarials are a type of antiparasitic chemical agent, often naturally derived, that can be used to treat or to prevent malaria, in the latter case, most often aiming at two susceptible target groups, young c ...
activity in mice. An ethanol extract of the rhizome has been shown to increase sperm count in rats.


Chemical constituents

''Alpinia galanga'' rhizome contains the
flavonol Flavonols are a class of flavonoids that have the 3-hydroxyflavone backbone (IUPAC name : 3-hydroxy-2-phenylchromen-4-one). Their diversity stems from the different positions of the phenolic -OH groups. They are distinct from flavanols (with "a ...
galangin. The rhizome contains an oil known as ''galangol'', which upon
fractional distillation Fractional distillation is the separation of a mixture into its component parts, or fractions. Chemical compounds are separated by heating them to a temperature at which one or more fractions of the mixture will vaporize. It uses distillation to ...
produces
cineol Eucalyptol is a monoterpenoid. A colorless liquid, it is a bicyclic ether. Eucalyptol has a fresh mint-like smell and a spicy, cooling taste. It is insoluble in water, but miscible with organic solvents. Eucalyptol makes up ~70% - 90% of eucal ...
(which has medicinal properties),
pinene Pinene is a collection of unsaturated bicyclic monoterpenes. Two geometric isomers of pinene are found in nature, α-pinene and β-pinene. Both are chiral. As the name suggests, pinenes are found in pines. Specifically, pinene is the major compo ...
, and
eugenol Eugenol is an allyl chain-substituted guaiacol, a member of the allylbenzene class of chemical compounds. It is a colorless to pale yellow, aromatic oily liquid extracted from certain essential oils especially from clove, nutmeg, cinnamon, bas ...
, among others.


See also

* Lesser galangal *
Domesticated plants and animals of Austronesia One of the major human migration events was the maritime settlement of the islands of the Indo-Pacific by the Austronesian peoples, believed to have started from at least 5,500 to 4,000 BP (3500 to 2000 BCE). These migrations were accompanie ...


References


Further reading


Greater galangal
* Scheffer, J.J.C. & Jansen, P.C.M., 1999. Alpinia galanga (L.) Willd. nternetRecord from Proseabase. de Guzman, C.C. and Siemonsma, J.S. (Editors). PROSEA (Plant Resources of South-East Asia) Foundation, Bogor, Indonesia


External links


Alpinia galanga (L.) Willd.
Medicinal Plant Images Database (School of Chinese Medicine, Hong Kong Baptist University) {{Authority control Alpinia, galanga Spices Medicinal plants of Asia