People who work in kitchen surely are familiar with clove. This is one of the spices with small size and brownish-reddish color. The spices have unique characteristic in term of flavor. It can make the foods has richer taste. Then, it also leaves warm sensation and that is why it is also popular ingredients for herbal drinks. In fact, cloves are not only greats as ingredients; you can find many other interesting facts, including the meaning of cloves and other stories about it.
Name of Cloves and Other Nice Facts
Cloves may have small size. However, it has quite strong smell and taste. That is why small portion of it in cooking can bring great differences. From the small size, actually there are also many interesting facts, including meaning of cloves and its benefits. You can check the details below.
Regarding the meaning of cloves, its name is derived from Latin, clavus. It means nail. Word with similar meaning can also be found in French and English. It is named as nail because its shape is similar to nails. In Indonesia that becomes one of the main places where the clove trees grow, it is called as cengkeh.
Although clove has small size, actually the trees have great height. The clove buds are harvested from the trees that can reach 12 meters. Normally, the trees grow well in high lands a low temperature. The trees start to grow flower after five years old. The buds are harvested and then they are dried. In a single tree, it can produce up to 34 kg of cloves annually. Currently, people do not only take the clove buds as the commodity. The leaves can also be processed to take the essences or extracts. These later can become precious clove oils.
Of course, one of the most common uses of cloves is for cooking. That is why people are so familiar with it although they may not know the meaning of cloves. In addition, people have used cloves for herbal remedies. With the current technology, its medical benefits are explored further and these at the same time confirm the great benefits of cloves as what people use traditionally.
It is easy to find cloves in the market. People can find them as a whole spices. But some sellers also sell the ground cloves or the powder. As for those who specifically want to get medical benefits from the spices, clove oils are the right choices. The products can be purchased in various pharmacies or herbal stores.
As what is mentioned previously, cloves have great health benefits. One of the important compounds is called eugenol. You do not need to know meaning of cloves, but it is more important to know functions of the eugenol. It has antioxidant, anti-bacterial, and even anti-inflammation properties. Thus, it makes cloves able to become cures and remedies for toothaches and even to control the blood sugar level. For women, acnes and dandruffs will not be issues anymore when they get treatment with cloves.