Peppermint essential oil has a cooling, pungent menthol aroma with a clean sweet top note, much like after dinner mints. It is one of the most beneficial essential oils for the digestive system and abdominal pain . It is also known to improve concentration and ease fatigue and nausea.
- Latin Name
- Mentha Arvensis
- Family
- Lamiaceae (Labiatae)
- Note
- Middle to Top
- Extraction
- Essential oil by steam distillation from the fresh or partly dried plant.
- Constituents
- Menthol, menthone, cineole, methyl acetate, methofuran, isomenthone, limonene, b-pinene, a-pinene, germacrene-d, trans-sabinene hydrate and pulegone.
- Origin
- China
This perennial herb can grow up to 1 meter in height and has slightly hairy serrated leaves with pinkish/mauve flowers arranged in a long conical shape.
History
Sometimes regarded as ‘the world’s oldest medicine’ It is used therapeutically in many ways, bruised leaves were applied to the forehead to relieve nervous headaches. In the East it is used to treat rheumatic pain, neuralgia, toothache, laryngitis, indigestion, colds and bronchitis. In Chinese medicine, it is also employed for relieving earache, treating tumors and some skin conditions.
