Lettuce salad: useful and medicinal properties

Lettuce is a herbaceous two-year-old plant that is grown as a leaf vegetable. It has no sour or bitter taste, and therefore refers to fresh salads. It is a low-growing plant about 20 cm high, consisting of a large number of closely adhered leaves that form a dense "head". The leaves of this salad can have both traditional green color, and yellow-green, and even red shades (depending on the variety).

In cooking, it is customary to use both stems and leaves of lettuce. It is added to salads, cold snacks or some hot dishes. Old leaves are suitable for extinguishing. Some varieties are grown exclusively for fragrant stems. The only drawback of this salad is that it loses most of its vitamins under temperature treatment. Therefore, it is recommended to eat it raw. Fresh leaves not only give the food a special pleasant aroma and taste, but also become an original and useful decoration for meat and fish dishes.

Lettuce is very rich in vitamins of group B, potassium, calcium, magnesium, iodine, iron, folic acid, and it also contains many alkaloids and resins. Regular use of lettuce promotes the revitalization of muscle fibers, the regeneration of nerve tissue, has a beneficial effect on brain activity. It is recommended for patients with tuberculosis, diabetes, elderly people. Lettuce has diuretic, soothing, hypnotic properties, reduces the amount of harmful cholesterol in the blood, prevents obesity. This salad is very widely used in folk medicine to strengthen hair roots, to treat coughing, increase lactation in women, with cystitis, rheumatism and salt deposition. This is a very valuable dietetic plant, which is useful not only for adults but also for children.

There are three varieties of salad: romaine, cabbage and lettuce lettuce. Cultivating them on their own land is not difficult. Seeds can be sown already in the middle of April right into the soil. But many gardeners continue to sow lettuce throughout the summer and even under winter - until mid-November. The recommended length between the grooves is 20 cm. One square meter of soil can sow up to 30 pieces of seeds. You can also prepare lettuces seedlings in a greenhouse or at home in boxes. Seedling grows well after diving. Planting it is recommended in such a way that the root neck of the plant is slightly below the soil level. But do not bury the seedlings in the soil too deep, otherwise it will rot.

Caring for a growing salad is very simple. It is necessary to periodically loosen the soil, moderately watered and occasionally fed. Watering is desirable to implement in the morning, and during the formation of the head irrigation is significantly reduced and watered only on the furrows. Harvesting begins when the head is sufficiently dense. His willingness to determine when pressing on the head of the back of the hand. Cut them as you go along, selectively. In Europe, such groups of salads as Butterhead, whose leaves have an oily texture, and Chinese lettuce are very common, its leaves are very elongated. In Russia, 6 cabbage and 1 leaf lettuce varieties are grown: Berlin Yellow, Moscow greenhouse, Kucheryavets Odessa, Maisky, Ramses, Riga and Romany sort - Paris green.

Do not confuse lettuce with a plant such as wild lettuce. It is a wild plant that is not eaten because it is considered poisonous. White milky juice of wild lettuce has the properties of opium, but in small quantities it is used in folk medicine for the treatment of kidney diseases, muscular and rheumatic pains.