Usually, we are used to cutting and throwing away vegetable tops, without attaching any importance to it, and in vain. Useful and tasty can be not only the roots of plants, but also their shoots sticking out of the ground. In addition, some types of tops make very delicious dishes, and recipes for infusions and decoctions are used as effective treatments for many ailments.
What is useful in inches?
Our ancestors were well aware of the benefits and taste qualities of vegetable tops: it was widely used in traditional Russian cooking – they cooked soups and borscht with it, made meat and cereal dishes, baked pies, and even made desserts and kvass.
Carrot and beet tops are the best basis for borsch in the traditional Russian spirit, beets were put in okroshka and cold beetroot. And there was also a special dish in Rus’ – botvinya, and if a Russian woman could not cook it, she was considered a bad housewife and did not marry. And it is impossible to imagine the traditional Russian borscht without beet tops.
What is it about the tops, why was it so valued by the ancestors? In the leaf parts of carrots, beets or radishes, the composition of vitamins and minerals is even wider than in root crops. There is a lot of ascorbic acid in the tops, which helps fight blues and strengthen the walls of blood vessels, a lot of folic acid, useful for the brain and nervous system, as well as high reserves of B vitamins, enough iron, potassium, magnesium and calcium, there is iodine.
Although it is unlikely that anyone will agree to eat raw tops, many chefs use it very widely in the composition of dishes.
Dishes from beet tops
Beet tops are great for vegetable diets. salads, as it is rich in fiber and quickly saturates. But before use, it must be washed very well on both sides, finely chopped with a knife and poured over with boiling water. After that, the leaves will become soft and tender, a specific aftertaste will not bother.
Beet tops are combined with cucumber, radish, green lettuce, spinach, greens and nuts, although you can vary the salads to your taste.
An ideal dressing for a salad with beet tops would be vegetable oil with apple, lemon or pomegranate juice, balsamic vinegar, sour cream and even mayonnaise!
Tops are added when preparing second courses – in vegetable and meat stews, in meatballs, to reduce calories and enrich with fiber. Beet tops are the basis for filling pies, and tops can also be prepared for future use – they are dried, fermented, salted, canned with other vegetables and then used in cooking in winter.
The benefits of beet leaves
- Dishes from beet tops are especially useful for people with cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, they will be invaluable for anemia, thyroid diseases and other endocrine pathologies.
- With a headache in the old days, a beet leaf was rubbed into a pulp, applied to the forehead for 15 minutes, and the pain disappeared.
- A crushed beet leaf is applied to the eyelids with conjunctivitis.
- A decoction of beet leaves helps in the fight against constipation: a tablespoon of leaves is poured with boiling water and infused until cool, they drink the whole glass in four doses per day.
- For freckles or pigmentation it is necessary to impose a slurry of leaves on the skin of the face previously wiped with a soda solution.
- Beets help with long-term healing wounds, cracking skin – use the juice of the leaves, gruel from them and a decoction for washing wounds and compresses. For diseases and cracks of the feet, foot baths are made with a decoction of the leaves.
- And also vitamins P and vitamin U help in the work of blood vessels, preventing atherosclerosis, activate metabolism and hematopoiesis, help in the treatment of peptic ulcer, gastritis and liver diseases.
- In addition, the antitumor effect of beets and its tops has been proven.
Benefits of radish and carrot tops
radish tops
Radish is rich in vitamins and microelements, and its tops are not inferior to fruits. It has a special aroma and taste, it can be added to vegetable salads like greens, in addition, it can be put in cabbage soup or borscht, stew meat with it.
Radish tops have a therapeutic effect and are used in the treatment of fungal infections of the foot. The leaves are dried and ground into a powder, which is sprinkled on the legs and the area between the fingers. The procedures are repeated until complete healing. The treatment is very effective.
carrot tops
Carrot tops are no less useful than beet tops. It is added to soups, salads and casseroles, they cook fish soup with it, make a marinade for preserving vegetables, and even drink tea. Our great-grandmothers rinsed their hair with a decoction of carrot tops for their active growth and strengthening.
Fresh tops of carrots are bitter, and to remove the bitterness, you need to pour boiling water over the tops for 15 minutes or simply pour over boiling water.
Carrot tops have long been used as a remedy:
- Healing tea for hemorrhoids is brewed from it – pour 1 teaspoon of tops (dried in a dark place) with a glass of boiling water and insist, drink a glass of medicinal infusion in several doses during the day. The average course of treatment is about two months.
- Useful carrot tops and with cystitis – drink pure infusion of carrot tops or mix it in equal proportions with parsley infusion.
- An infusion of carrot tops is used for fibroids and bleeding.
- To remove stones and sand from the bladder, after a bath, a compress is placed on the lower abdomen from a cloth soaked in a decoction of carrot tops and seeds. And with polyarthritis, onion juice and grated carrots were added to them.
- Lotions with a decoction of carrot tops make for skin problems – dermatitis, psoriasis, allergies.
Have you tried dishes with tops?
