Cucumber

Parts Usually Used

Fruit

Description of Plant(s) and Culture

The cucumber plant is a fleshy, bristly, creeping or climbing vine that attaches itself to objects by means of tendrils. The leaves are mostly long-petioled, cordate, and incised to make 5 points. The flowers are golden-yellow and bell-shaped. The fruit is well known to everyone. The word cucumber is used with other herbs: Wild cucumber or balsam apple (Echinocystis lobata); Indian cucumber (Medeola virginiana); Cucumber magnolia (Magnolia acuminata); none of which have anything to do with the garden variety of cucumber.

Where Found

Mostly cultivated.

Medicinal Properties

Aperient, diuretic, astringent, refrigerant, alterative

Legends, Myths and Stories

Since ancient times, the juice of the cucumber has been used as a facial cleanser and as a treatment for skin irritations. Cleopatra herself was reputed to have used cucumber to preserve her beautiful skin. Chang Chien, the noted legate of the Han Dynasty, seems to have brought cucumber (Hu-kua) from Central Asia to China, as he did other useful plants. Cucumber juice is used in many skin products.

); the seeds were roasted and eaten for kidney troubles by California Native Americans. When a cucumber is taken from the vine, cut it with a knife leaving about 1/8 of an inch of the cucumber on the stem, then slit the stem with a knife from its end to the vine, leaving a small portion of the cucumber on each division. On each separate split there will be a new cucumber formed as large as the first; thus, making the cucumber vines bear more crops.

According to the old ways, this method of keeping cucumbers is given. For one barrel, use 3 lbs. of alum, 6 qt. of salt and water sufficient to cover them. Finely pulverize the alum and use coarse salt (solar salt, such as used for packing is best, as it contains no lime). Use only 1/4 the quantity to commence on as those put in first will take all the strength of the brine. Keep a weight on them and treat as ordinary salt pickles.

Uses

Traditional herbalists used cucumber as a diuretic, believing it helped eliminate water from the body and supported the kidneys, bladder, lungs, and intestines. Folk practitioners valued it for dissolving uric acid accumulations, such as kidney and bladder stones, and consumed it as a vegetable to encourage bowel regularity. Externally, herbal traditions utilized the juice and sliced fruit for cosmetic and dermatological applications, recommending topical use for skin cleansing, rough skin, freckles, discolored patches, and sunburn.

It was also applied historically as a soothing agent for general inflammations, bed sores, scalds, and burns.

How Sold

In the supermarket produce section.

Bibliography

Culpeper’s Complete Herbal & English Physician: Updated With 117 Modern Herbs , by Nicholas Culpeper, Meyerbooks, publisher, PO Box 427, Glenwood, Illinois 60425, 1990, (reprint of 1814) Chinese Medicinal Herbs , compiled by Shih-Chen Li, Georgetown Press, San Francisco, California, 1973. Eastern/Central Medicinal Plants , by Steven Foster and James A. , Simon & Schuster/Fireside, Rockefeller Center 1230 Avenue of the Americas, New York, New York 10020 The Herb Book , by John Lust, Bantam Books, 666 Fifth Avenue, New York, NY.

copyright 1974. Indian Uses of Native Plants , by Edith Van Allen Murphey, Meyerbooks, publisher, PO Box 427, Glenwood, Illinois 60425, copyright 1958, print 1990 The Magic of Herbs in Daily Living , by Richard Lucas, Parker Publishing Co. (1988). , Lotus Press, PO Box 325, Twin Lakes. , 15 Columbus Circle, New York, NY 10023 The Rodale Herb Book: How to Use, Grow, and Buy Nature’s Miracle Plants (An Organic gardening and farming book) , edited by William H.

Hylton, Rodale Press, Inc. , 1974