• Skip to primary navigation
  • Skip to main content
  • Skip to primary sidebar

CooksInfo

  • Home
  • Encyclopaedia
  • Kitchenware
  • Recipes
  • Food Calendar
menu icon
go to homepage
search icon
Homepage link
  • Recipes
  • Encyclopaedia
  • Kitchenware
  • Food Calendar
×
Home » Herbs » Wormwood

Wormwood

WormwoodWormwood
© Denzil Green

Wormwood is a perennial herb native to Eurasia and northern Africa.

It has woody stalks, and grows up to about 3 feet (1 metre) tall with clusters of silvery-green leaves. It flowers with pale yellow blossoms, also in clusters.

It has a bitter taste; in fact, the only herb more bitter is Rue. Its odor can repel pests from a garden.

There are at least two different kinds of Wormwood: Grand wormwood, aka Common wormwood (Artemisia absinthium); and Petite Wormwood, aka Roman wormwood (Artemesia Pontica.)

Petite Wormwood is used as a flavouring in many alcoholic drinks, such as Vermouth [1] and Campari. Oil from Grand Wormwood is used in Vick’s Vaporub. Grand Wormwood was a key ingredient in the alcoholic drink called “Absinthe.”

Wormwood contains Thujone (also found in the herb Tansy), which can be toxic to the brain and liver in high concentrations. Hallucinations have been blamed on it. Consequently, from 1900 to 1914, there was a wave of laws banning Absinthe in just about every first world country save Britain and Spain. Some researchers have recently suggested that the deleterious effects of Absinthe didn’t have much to do with the Wormwood, as the level of it in Absinthe turned out to not be very high after all, but rather had a lot to do with the 60% to 85% alcohol that some Absinthes were.

The use of Wormwood in products for consumption is allowed now, but EU regulations require that thujone levels be less than 35mg/litre in bitters, 10mg/litre in other drinks. In the US, it must be less than 10 ppm.
____________________________________

[1] Note that the German name for Wormwood is “Wermut” or “wermuota” in Old High German.

Language Notes

In Middle English, “wermode”, likely alluding to its use as a folk cure for intestinal worms.

Other names

Scientific Name: Artemisia absinthium

This page first published: Sep 23, 2010 · Updated: Jun 14, 2018.

This web site generates income from affiliated links and ads at no cost to you to fund continued research · Information on this site is Copyright © 2023· Feel free to cite correctly, but copying whole pages for your website is content theft and will be DCMA'd.

Primary Sidebar

Search

    Today is

  • Iced Tea Day
    Iced tea with lemon
  • Herbs & Spices Day
    Herbs and spices in bowls

Hi, I'm Skylar! This is a fake profile talking about how I switched to a paleo diet and it helped my eczema and I grew 4". Trust me, I'm an online doctor.

More about me →

Popular

  • E.D. Smith Pumpkin Purée
    E.D. Smith recipe for pumpkin pie
  • Libby's Pumpkin Pie
    Libby’s recipe for pumpkin pie
  • Pie crust
    Pie Crust Recipe
  • Smokey Maple Pepper Glaze for Ham
    Smokey Maple Pepper Glaze for Ham

You can duplicate your homepage's trending recipes section in the sidebar to reinforce the internal linking.

We no longer recommend using a search bar, newsletter form or category drop-down menu in the sidebar. See the Modern Sidebar post for details.

If the block editor is not narrower than usual, simply save the page and refresh it.

Footer

↑ back to top

About

  • About this site
  • Privacy Policy
  • Copyright enforced!
  • Terms & Conditions

Newsletter

  • Sign Up! for emails and updates

Site

  • Recipes
  • Encyclopaedia
  • Kitchenware
  • Food Calendar

This web site generates income from affiliated links and ads at no cost to you to fund continued research · The text on this site is © Copyright.