WOODRUFF

Woodruff sweet is a small, slightly sweet-scented perennial herb widespread throughout Europe and the Near East. It has very thin creeping rhizomes, both fertile and sterile stalks, and spear-like oblong leaves arranged about the central axis of the stalk (verticil) as spokes on a wheel. The verticils are spaced along the length of the stalk. The plant has terminal flowers (usually three) with white petals and blooms from June to July. The dried herb is commercially available throughout Europe. The whole plant is used. Sweet woodruff has a heavy, sweet, tobacco-like flavor and odor. The plant does not yield an essential oil upon steam distillation. While the fresh plant is nearly odorless, it exhibits a coumarin-like fragrance when dried.

The agreeable odor of sweet woodruff is due to coumarin. The plant also contains citric, malic and rubichloric acids, together with some tannic acid. Coumarin is present in glycosidic form, which is freed by the enzymatic action during the drying process. The other minor components include asperuloside (0.05%) and monoterpein.*