Fennel

Foeniculum Vulgare

Other Names: Anethum Foeniculum, Anethum piperitum, Bari-Sanuf, Bitter Fennel, Carosella, Common Fennel, Fennel Essential Oil, Fennel Oil, Fennel Seed, Fenouil, Fenouil Amer, Fenouil Bulbeux, Fenouil Commun, Fenouil de Florence, Fenouil des Vignes, Fenouil Doux, Fenouil Sauvage, Finnochio, Florence Fennel, Foeniculi Antheroleum, Foeniculum Capillaceum, Foeniculum Officinale, Foeniculum piperitum, Foeniculum Vulgare, Garden Fennel, Graine de Fenouil, Hinojo, Huile Essentielle de Fenouil, Huile de Fenouil, Large Fennel, Phytoestrogen, Phyto-œstrogène, Sanuf, Shatapuspha, Sweet Fennel, Wild Fennel, Xiao Hui Xiang
Fennel is a perennial, pleasant-smelling herb with yellow flowers. It is native to the Mediterranean, but is now found throughout the world. Dried fennel seeds are often used in cooking as an anise-flavored spice. But don’t confuse fennel with anise; though they look and taste similar, they are not the same. Fennel’s dried ripe seeds and oil are used to make medicine.

Special Precautions of Fennel

• Fennel is LIKELY SAFE in the amounts found in food. For the most part, there isn’t enough evidence to know whether it is safe for adults or children when used in medicinal amounts. However, researchers have studied a combination product (Colimil) for colic that contains fennel, lemon balm, and German chamomile. This product seems to be safe in infants when used for up to one week.
• Some people can have allergic skin reactions to fennel. People who are allergic to plants such as celery, carrot, and mugwort are more likely to also be allergic to fennel. Fennel can also make skin extra sensitive to sunlight and make it easier to get a sunburn. Wear sunblock if you are light-skinned.
• Pregnancy and breast-feeding: Not enough is known about the safety of using fennel during pregnancy. It’s best to avoid use.During breast-feeding, fennel is POSSIBLY UNSAFE. It’s been reported that two breast-feeding infants experienced damage to their nervous systems after their mothers drank an herbal tea that contained fennel.
• Fennel contains a chemical, estragole, which has caused liver cancer in laboratory mice.
• Allergy to celery, carrot or mugwort: Fennel might cause an allergic reaction in people who are sensitive to these plants.
• Hormone-sensitive condition such as breast cancer, uterine cancer, ovarian cancer, endometriosis, or uterine fibroids: Fennel might act like estrogen. If you have any condition that might be made worse by exposure to estrogen, don’t use fennel.
• Birth control pills (Contraceptive drugs) interacts with fennel.
• Ciprofloxacin (Cipro) interacts with fennel.
• Estrogens interacts with fennel.
• Tamoxifen (Nolvadex) interacts with fennel.

The benefits of Fennel are

Fennel is one of the few plants that has it all — it’s a vegetable, herb and spice. That tang of licorice when you bite into a fennel seed comes from the volatile oil anethole, the same compound that gives anise its licorice-like flavor. Fennel is used for various digestive problems including heartburn, intestinal gas, bloating, loss of appetite, and colic in infants. It is also used for upper respiratory tract infections, coughs, bronchitis, cholera, backache, bedwetting, and visual problems. Some women use fennel for increasing the flow of breast milk, promoting menstruation, easing the birthing process, and increasing sex drive.

• Calms Menstrual Cramps : Fennel seeds are teeming with anethole and dozens of other phytochemicals, including phytoestrogens, estrogen-like compounds found in plants. These can help offset menstrual cramps that affect more than 50 percent of menstruating women.
• Colic in breast-fed infants. In a study, doctors treated 125 infants with colic, dividing them into one group that received a product containing fennel seed oil and one that received a placebo. The fennel seed product eliminated colic in 65 percent of the babies given it, compared with 24 percent of the placebo group.
• Stomach upset and indigestion.
• Breast Cancer : anethole, the organic substance known for its antimicrobial and antifungal properties, has proven in a study to stop breast cancer cells from growing. Not only that. It also prevents these cells from surviving. In fact, the anethole can cause the breast cancer cells to kill themselves altogether in some cases. This means that at the very least it can slow the growth and spread of breast cancer.
• Airway swelling.
• Bronchitis.
• Cough.
• Mild spasms of the stomach and intestines.
• Intestinal gas (flatulence).
• Bloating.
• Upper respiratory tract infection.
• Detox : Fennel is a mildly diuretic, which may help with the removal of toxic substances from the body