Clove, “the nail-shaped fragrance”

Ding Xiang reads “the nail-shaped fragrance”: once dried, the flower bud has exactly that shape, a straight stem topped with a small round head. French says the same thing by the same detour, and the English clove comes from the Latin clavus, the nail. It never grew in China: it is an imported spice, which arrived under the Han, when courtiers had to keep one in their mouth to scent their breath before an audience. It is the bud of Syzygium aromaticum, an evergreen tree of the Moluccas, picked just before opening, when it turns from green to bright red. A good clove is large, oily to the touch, and so rich in oil that it sinks in water instead of floating. It remains one of the five ingredients of five-spice powder.

Warming the Middle, restoring the Stomach’s direction

In Traditional Chinese Medicine, clove is warm and has a single, clear-cut flavour: pungent, which moves and disperses. Combined with a very powerful aroma for such a small thing, it warms by penetrating. It enters the Spleen and Stomach, the Middle of digestion. According to tradition, the nature of the Stomach is to send downwards; when Cold settles in the Middle, this movement is thwarted and the Qi rises. Clove disperses this Cold and gives the Stomach back its natural direction: tradition has made it its reference substance for this. When a cold food lingers and weighs heavy, its warm pungency also helps stagnant Qi to circulate.

From the Middle to the Kidney

Clove also descends to the Kidney, whose Yang it supports. Its warmth there is modest, much gentler than that of the great tonics such as cassia bark, but it is the only one to hold both ends, the Middle and the Kidney, in the same small amount. When Cold tightens the belly, its pungent warmth lifts this contraction, and tradition notes that what is involved responds better to warmth and pressure. It is added at the end of cooking, as its action lies in its volatile oil. Modern research takes a particular interest in eugenol, its main compound.