What is Chinese herb hyacinth bean used for

What is hyacinth bean?
Also known as Lablab purpureus or Dolichos labla, it is actually the seed of hyacinth plant. It has a few different names in different places, such as lablab bean, poor man’s bean, and Tonga bean, to name but a few. In China, the funny thing is that they don’t name after the color of purple but white.

This plant is one of Fabaceae annuals. It is native to tropics like Africa, Indonesia, and India. Later it was introduced to China in the Han and Jin Dynasty. This climbing herb can grow up to 6 meters in length. Stem presents light purple or light green color, usually glabrous or villous. The trifoliate leaves are with stalk of 4 to 14cm long. Hyacinth flower is often second racemes, 15 to 25cm long, and with erect sturdy florescence rachis. It usually produces 2 to 5 bean seeds in one pod, which are elliptical, white or magenta even black in color, 8 to 13mm long, 6 to 9mm wide, 4 to 7mm thick, with long ridgy umbilici and raphe, white ridgy semilunar strophiole in one side edge.

What is it used for?
As mentioned earlier, besides as an ornamental vine, it is food crop as well. Traditionally people consume the seeds, leaves, roots, pods and flowers. Curry and salad are two common favorite delicacies in some places. What’s more, its edible seeds can serve as a medicinal herb though being considered toxic because of high concentrations of cyanogenic glucosides contained. But results of modern experiments indicate that boiling it for long enough time can make it harmless at all.