Ode to Shan Yao

I've always been attracted to Shan Yao, probably because it is a very good match with my spleen-yin-deficient constitution. In school I enjoyed the idea of a spleen tonic that is not drying, but actually moistening. Ren shen is another spleen tonic with moistening qualities, but one has to be careful prescribing ren shen for people with heat. Shan yao, it seems to me, can be given safely to anyone with spleen deficiency. Maybe it wouldn't be your first choice in a case of spleen qi deficiency with lots of damp, but it certainly wouldn't do any harm included in a formula with other, more drying, spleen tonics. It might actually serve as a nice antagonistic assistant, moderating the drying quality of more acrid spleen tonics.

After graduation I lived for a year in China and am now living in Japan. Both countries use shan yao regularly in their cuisine, and I've come to love it more as a food than as medicine. It is most often served raw and eating it I feel like I am doing something great for my spleen and stomach. It's cool stickiness will be just the thing for my stomach that tends to run hot and dry, while its crisp fibers seem like they will be perfect for a tired out spleen.

In China, shan yao is often served as a dessert or sweet dish, which surprised me at first. I'll never forget one of my first days in Beijing going into a restaurant. I couldn't read much on the menu, but I recognized the characters for shan yao (山药) and ordered it. Man was I shocked when I was served a plate of raw shan yao... topped with strawberry jam! I never really got into the sweet shan yao dishes, except for one. This dish (pictured on right below) was raw, cubed shan yao coated with hot sugar syrup. To eat it, you take a cube in your chopsticks and dip it quickly in a bowl of cool water. This instantly hardens the sugar syrup, giving you a crunchy, warm-on-the-inside treat when you bite into it. I'm not sure what kind of sugar it was, but it seemed pretty good quality.

In Japan, shan yao (山芋, yama imo) is most often served "tororo" style. To make this, you basically grate it very finely. But instead of turning into little slices, it turns it into a slimy goop (pictured on left below). Usually, this is then put over hot or cold noodles (soba or udon) and mixed in with other condiments (wasabi, ginger, seaweed, fish broth, sesame seeds). It is sometimes put over rice, or can be eaten straight with a little soy sauce for flavoring. My favorite way to enjoy shan yao is probably tororo style with cold soba noodles, fish broth and wasabi. That's a happy spleen!

Anyway, hope you enjoyed my tribute to shan yao. I hope you can discover the joy of making it part of your diet. Just using it in decoctions just seems like such a waste...