ARABIDOPSIS EDIBLE?
Many genera in the family Brassicaceae, to which Arabidopsis belongs, are edible. We examined the value of Arabidopsis other than as a scientifically useful weed. A relative of Arabidopsis (Shiroinu-Nazuna in Japanese), Capsella (Nazuna in Japanese), serves as a herb. We Japanese traditionally have a feast made from seven young spring herbs including Capsella on January 7 in every year. We feel the joy of spring by taking a bowl of rice gruel (porridge) cooked with the seven spring herbs in winter. Capsella is reported to contain choline, acetylcholine, and fumaric acid, and to be an excellent herb for antipyretic, hemostatic, and diuretic effects. Kyoko Kobayashi at this laboratory tried to cook Arabidopsis to prepare healthy breakfast. It is nice with Vienna sausage saute, scrambled egg, vegetable salad, and consomme soup, and in a vase for looking. We ate them and concluded that Arabidopsis is a good substitution for vegetables when we could not find any vegetables in a refrigerator. However, Arabidopsis is costly as a food due to a small mass of leaves.
