Description
Root can be eaten cooked. Dried leaves flavour herb teas as a sweetener while the cooked young leaves can be added to soup. Tea is brewed from leaves, flowers and root. Flowers can be added to stewed fruit, or added to wine or beer. Flower syrup is added to fruit salads and cooling drinks.
One of the three moist sacred herbs used by the Druids, meadowsweet has a long history of use as a medicine. The flower head contains salicylic acid, from which aspirin is synthesized. Leaves and flowering stems are alterative, anti-inflammatory, antiseptic, aromatic, astringent, diaphoretic, diuretic, stomachic and tonic. Used for gastritis, peptic ulcers and hyperacidity and heartburn.
A black dye is made from the roots and a yellow dye from the plant tops.
Flower buds are used in perfumery, both flowers and leaves have been used in pot-pourri, and as strewing herbs.
