Recipes starting with G

There are two kinds of Galbanum in commerce, viz. Levant Galbanurn and the Persian Galbanum. The latter is softer than the Levant, has a more terebinthic odour, has the smell and consistency of Venice turpentine, and contains fruit and fragments of stalks in place of bits of sliced roots. Several species of Ferula are used as a source for commercial Galbanum, but the official plant is Ferula galbaniflua, a perennial, with smooth stem, and shining leaflets, ovate, wedge-shaped, acute and finely serrated on the edges. The umbels of flowers are few, the seeds shiny. The whole plant abounds with a milky juice, which oozes from the joints of old plants, and exudes and hardens from the base of the stem after it has been cut down, then is finally obtained by incisions made in the root. The juice from the root soon hardens and forms the tears of the Galbanum of Commerce. The best tears are palish externally and about the size of a hazel nut and when broken open are composed of clear white tears. The taste is unpleasant, bitterish, acrid, with a strong, peculiar, somewhat aromatic smell. The common kind is an agglutinated mass, showing reddish and white tears, this is of the consistency of firm wax, and can easily be torn to pieces and softened by heat; when cold it is brittle, and mixed with seeds and leaves, when imported in lumps it is often considered preferable to the tears as it contains more volatile oil. Distilled with water it yields a quantity of essential oil, about 6 drachms, to 1 lb. of gum. It was well known to the ancients and Pliny called it 'bubonion.' Galbanum under dry distillation yields a thick oil of a bluish colour, which after purification becomes the blue colour of the oil obtained from the flowers of Matricaria Chamomilla.

Woody lianas; climbing by hooks formed from reduced, modified branches. Stipules entire or bifid. Inflorescence a compact head, terminal, at the ends of plagiotropic branches and their very reduced branches. Corolla lobes without appendages. Seeds with a long wing at each end, the lower wing deeply bifid.

The commercial Gamboge is obtained from several varieties, though Garcinia Hanburyii is the official plant, an almost similar gum is obtained from Hypericum. The Gamboge tree grows to a height of 50 feet, with a diameter of 12 inches, and the gum resin is extracted by incisions or by breaking off the leaves and shoots of the trees, the juice which is a milky yellow resinous gum, resides in the ducts of the bark and is gatheredin vessels, and left to thicken and become hardened. Pipe Gamboge is obtained by letting the juice run into hollowed bamboos, and when congealed the bamboo is broken away from it. The trees must be ten years old before they are tapped, and the gum is collected in the rainy season from June to October. 

The roots of the Common Angelica are long and spindle-shaped, thick and fleshy - large specimens weighing sometimes as much as three pounds - and are beset with many long, descending rootlets. The stems are stout fluted, 4 to 6 feet high and hollow. The foliage is bold and pleasing, the leaves are on long stout, hollow footstalks, often 3 feet in length, reddish purple at the much dilated, clasping bases; the blades, of a bright green colour, are much cut into, being composed of numerous small leaflets, divided into three principal groups, each of which is again subdivided into three lesser groups. The edges of the leaflets are finely toothed or serrated. The flowers, small and numerous, yellowish or greenish in colour, are grouped into large, globular umbels. They blossom in July and are succeeded by pale yellow, oblong fruits, 1/6 to a 1/4 inch in length when ripe, with membraneous edges, flattened on one side and convex on the other, which bears three prominent ribs. Both the odour and taste of the fruits are pleasantly aromatic.

The root is long and thick, generally about a foot long and an inch in diameter, but sometimes even a yard or more long and 2 inches in diameter, of a yellowish-brown colour and a very bitter taste.

The stem grows 3 or 4 feet high or more, with a pair of leaves opposite to one another, at each joint. The lowest leaves have short foot-stalks, but the upper ones are stalkless, their bases almost embracing the stem.

They are yellowish-green in colour, oblong in shape and pointed, rather stiff, with five prominent veins on the underside, and diminish gradually in size as they grow up the stem. The large flowers are in whorls in the axils of the uppermost few pairs of leaves, forming big orange-yellow clusters.

The corollas are wheel-shaped, usually five-cleft, 2 inches across, sometimes marked with rows of small brown spots, giving a red tinge to the otherwise deep yellow. Seeds in abundance are produced by strong plants, and stock is easily raised from them.

Iris germanica grows up to 120 cm high and 30 cm wide. The roots can go up to 10 cm deep. It is a rhizomatous perennial that blooms in April to June. Lifting, dividing and replanting the rhizomes is best done once flowering has finished as this is when the plant grows the new shoots that will flower the following year. The rhizomes are placed on the surface of the soil facing towards the sun and with at least 45cm of open ground in front of them - this allows two years growth and flowering. The plant is held in place by removing half the leaf mass to reduce wind rock and by using the old roots as anchors in the soil. The rhizome is placed on well dug ground and the roots placed either side into 10cm deep grooves. The soil os then gently firmed around the roots, so holding the plant steady. New roots and leaves are created rapidly as the rhizome moves forwards.

Ginger is a spice and more popular in Central Europe, probably because the exotic cuisine, spreading more and more. Many grocery stores now have to get fresh ginger roots.

But not only as an exotic spice, ginger is suitable, but also a valuable remedy. His special ability is to eliminate nausea.

It has a thick, yellow knotted rootstock. The stem is purplish and hairy above ground and yellow below ground where it connects to the yellow rhizome. The plant bears two palmate, hairy leaves with 5–7 double-toothed lobes and single, small, inconspicuous flowers with greenish white stamens in the late spring. It bears a single berry like a large raspberry with 10–30 seeds in the summer.

Vitis vinifera is a deciduous Climber growing to 15 m (49ft 3in) at a fast rate. It has larger fruits, 6-22 mm, which are sweet and vary in colour from green, yellow, red, or blackish-purple, with 2 or no seeds. 

Vine stems are "lianas" or woody, climbing vines and can be up to 35 m, climbing over trees, rocks or the pergola at the third floor of my neighbour's apartment. In cultivation it is usually reduced by annual pruning to 1-3 m. Most grapes have loose, flaky bark on older wood usually peeling from old stems in long shreds, but smooth bark on 1-year-old wood.

The leafs are cordate, usually palmately 5- to 7-lobed, leaf margins irregularly toothed (dentate), alternate and stipulate. The frizzy, long curly hairs can be found at the underside of the leaf; this arachnoid tomentum looks like the threads of a spiders cobweb. The veins at the underside of the leaf are also hairy. The upperside is glabrescent. Leaves can be quite large, sometimes more then 25 cm in width.

Sarsaparilla is a perennial woody climber with tendrils, thin branches and extended ovate leaves that grows about 4 to 5 meters vertically. Its paper-like leaves are pinnate veined, leathery and alternatively arranged. The leaves' width ranges from 10 to 30 cm and the petioles' length is about 5 cm. It is known for its small red berries with 2 or 3 seeds and small green flowers. The flowers are radially symmetrical, dioecious and have umbel inflorescence of 12 flowers. The berries are produced in the fall or in the late summer and stays intact through the winter for animals and birds to eat. Thus the pollination occurs as the unharmed seeds are found in the feces. The surface of the stem is smooth; it also is bent and have thorns at the joints. The hairy roots of sarsaparilla are fibrous and may have few rootlets growing out. They have stiff surface and are deep-rooted, which grows from 2 to 2.5 meters. The color of the roots ranges from brownish gray to black. Sarsaparilla is a persistent plant; even when most roots are cut off from the stem, roots will grow few years later but will be slender and less starchy.

This climbing shrub has divided compound leaves, flowers yellow panicles, fruit pear shaped, three sided, three-celled capsules, with thin partitions, in each a seed like a small horse-chestnut half enclosed in an aril, flesh coloured and easily separated when dried.

After the seeds are shelled and washed they are roasted for six hours, then put into sacks and shaken till their outside shell comes off, they are then pounded into a fine powder and made into a dough with water, and rolled into cylindrical pieces 8 inches long; these are then dried in the sun or over a slow fire, till they became very hard and are then a rough and reddish-brown colour, marbled with the seeds and testa in the mass. They break with an irregular fracture, have little smell, taste astringent, and bitter like chocolate without its oiliness, and in colour like chocolate powder; it swells up and partially dissolves in water.

Acacia senegal is a low branching shrub or small tree to 7 m high (maximum 15 m). The tree flowers during the rainy season and loses its leaves during the dry season. When water is only available at great depth, deeply penetrating tap roots can develop, and the tree will grow considerably larger than normal.

The bark of Acacia senegal is yellow to brown and smooth in young trees, becoming dark grey, gnarled and cracked on older trees. It is armed with recurved prickles just below the nodes, in pairs or in groups of three.The leaves are 3.5 to 8 cm long, with 3 to 8 pairs of pinnae.

The rachis (main stem of the compound leaf) sometimes bears prickles. The pinnae are 1.5 to 2.5 cm long with 5 to 25 pairs of leaflets per pinna. The leaflets are 1 to 9 mm long, 0.5 to 3 mm wide, elongated-oval shape, sparsely hairy or smooth on both surfaces.

The flowers are borne on spikes 3 to 8.5 cm long. The fruits are flat, papery and yellowish to brown. The hairy fruits are yellow-brown, flat and papery, 1.8 to 9 cm long, 1.2 to 3.4 cm wide, 2 mm thick and open on maturity to discharge the seeds.