Xinhui Chen Pi, the peel that improves with age
Chen Pi reads “aged peel”: a mandarin peel only earns this name after at least three years of storage. It is perhaps the only Chinese herb that improves with age, and Tao Hongjing laid down the principle: “the older it is, the better it is”. Its benchmark growing region is the district of Xinhui, in Jiangmen, Guangdong, where a particular cultivar, Chazhi, yields Guang Chen Pi, the highest grade. There, the Xijiang and the Tanjiang meet the tide of the South China Sea and deposit mineral-rich alluvium. As much a food as a pharmacopoeia herb, it holds a large place in Cantonese cooking.
In Xinhui, mandarins have been grown for their peel for more than seven centuries, and Xinhui Chen Pi is today a protected geographical indication, recognised by the Chinese Pharmacopoeia and by the China-European Union agreement on geographical indications. A good Xinhui peel is thin, about one millimetre, cut into three segments still joined together; between three and five years, it is reddish brown on the outside and keeps a fresh, fruity fragrance.
Regulating the Qi, supporting the Spleen
In traditional Chinese medicine, Chen Pi is warm, pungent and bitter in flavour, and associated with the Spleen and the Lung. Li Shizhen summed up what these qualities give it: the bitter descends and dries, the pungent disperses, the warm harmonises. Tradition describes it as the most accommodating of the Qi herbs: it gets the Qi of the Middle moving again without harshness, supports the Spleen in its task of transforming food and Fluids, and helps the Stomach Qi to descend. Gentle enough to enter tonifying formulas, it keeps them from stagnating: this is the principle of tonifying without clogging.
Drying Dampness, dissolving Phlegm
According to tradition, when the Spleen weakens, Dampness accumulates and condenses into Phlegm that rises to clutter the Lung. Present in both these meridians, the peel acts on both the root and the branch: its bitterness dries, its pungency disperses. With pinellia, it forms the heart of Er Chen Tang, the decoction “of the two aged ones”, and with atractylodes the framework of Ping Wei San. Modern research is taking a particular interest in hesperidin, its main flavonoid.
Key benefits
Qi in Motion & Lightness
The Qi herb par excellence, Chen Pi supports the circulation of the Qi of the Middle, without harshness.
Supported Spleen & Digestive Balance
It supports the Spleen, harmonises the Stomach and makes the rich herbs added to it easier to assimilate.
Transformed Dampness & Dissolved Phlegm
Bitter and pungent, it helps transform Dampness and dissolve Phlegm, from the Spleen to the Lung.
