Leaf vegetable

Leaf Vegetable

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Leaf vegetable

Leaf vegetables, also called potherbs, greens, or leafy greens, are plant leaves

Leaf

In botany, a leaf is an above-ground plant Organ specialized for photosynthesis. For this purpose, a leaf is typically flat and thin, to expose the cells containing chloroplast to light over a broad area, and to allow light to penetrate fully into the tissues....
eaten as a vegetable

Vegetable

The term "vegetable" generally means the Eating parts of plants. The definition of the word is traditional rather than scientific, however, and therefore the usage of the word is somewhat arbitrary and subjective, as it is determined by individual cultural customs of food selection and food preparation....
, sometimes accompanied by tender petiole

Petiole (botany)

In botany, the petiole is the small stalk attaching the leaf blade to the Plant stem. The petiole usually has the same internal structure as the stem....
s and shoot

Shoot

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Are herbs the same classifatcation/speices as vegetables? (leafly green)

Encyclopedia

Leaf vegetables, also called potherbs, greens, or leafy greens, are plant leaves

Leaf

Vegetable

Petiole (botany)

In botany, the petiole is the small stalk attaching the leaf blade to the Plant stem. The petiole usually has the same internal structure as the stem....
s and shoot

Shoot

Shoots are new plant growth, they can include plant stem, flowering stems with flower buds, leaves. The new growth from seed germination that grows upward is a shoot where leaves will develop....
s. Although they come from a very wide variety of plants, most share a great deal with other leaf vegetables in nutrition

Nutrition

Nutrition is the provision, to cells and organisms, of the materials necessary to support life. Many common health problems can be prevented or alleviated with good nutrition....
and cooking

Cooking

Cooking is the process of preparing food by applying heat, selecting, measuring and combining of ingredients in an ordered procedure for producing safe and edible food....
methods.

Nearly one thousand species of plants with edible leaves

List of plants with edible leaves

These are plants whose leaves are known to have been eaten by humans, typically as leaf vegetables or herbs.Inclusion on this list does not imply safety....
are known. Leaf vegetables most often come from short-lived herb

Herb

A herb is a plant that is valued for qualities such as medicinal properties, flavor, scent, or the like....
aceous plants such as lettuce

Lettuce

Lettuce is a temperate annual plant or biennial plant of the daisy family Asteraceae. It is most often grown as a leaf vegetable. In many countries, it is typically eaten cold, raw, in salads, hamburgers, tacos, and in many other dishes....
and spinach

Spinach

Spinach is a flowering plant in the family of Amaranthaceae. It is native to central and southwestern Asia. It is an annual plant , which grows to a height of up to 30 cm....
. Woody plants whose leaves can be eaten as leaf vegetables include Adansonia, Aralia
Aralia

Aralia is a genus of the plant family Araliaceae, consisting of 68 accepted species of deciduous and evergreen trees and shrubs, and some rhizomatous herbaceous perennial plants....
, Moringa
Moringa

Moringa is the only genus in the family Moringaceae. This genus comprises 13 species, all of which are trees that grow in tropical and Subtropics climates....
, Morus, and Toona
Toona

Toona is a genus of five species of trees in the mahogany family Meliaceae, native from Afganistan south to India, and east to North Korea, Papua New Guinea and eastern Australia ....
species.

The leaves of many fodder

Fodder

In agriculture, fodder or animal feed is any foodstuff that is used specifically to feed domesticated livestock, such as cattle, goats, sheep, horses, chickens and pigs....
crops are also edible by humans, but usually only eaten under famine

Famine

A famine is a widespread shortage of food that may apply to any faunal species, which phenomenon is usually accompanied by regional malnutrition, starvation, epidemic, and increased death....
conditions. Examples include alfalfa

Alfalfa

Alfalfa is a flowering plant in the pea family Fabaceae cultivated as an important forage crop. In the United Kingdom, Australia and New Zealand it is known as lucerne and as lucerne grass in south Asia....
, clover

Clover

Clover , or trefoil, is a genus of about 300 species of plants in the pea family Fabaceae. The genus has a cosmopolitan distribution; the highest diversity is found in the temperate Northern Hemisphere, but many species also occur in South America and Africa, including at high altitudes on mountains in the tropics....
, and most grass

Poaceae

Poaceae or Gramineae is a family in the Class Liliopsida of the Magnoliophyta. Plants of this family are usually called grasses; the shrub- or tree-like plants in this family are called bamboo ....
es, including wheat

Wheat

Wheat , is a worldwide cultivated Poaceae from the Levant region of the Middle East. Globally, after maize, wheat is the second most-produced food among the cereal just above rice....
and barley

Barley

Barley is an annual plant cereal grain derived from the grass Hordeum vulgare. It serves as a major animal feed crop, with smaller amounts used for malting and in health food, as well as the making of alcoholic beverages beer and whisky....
. These plants are often much more prolific than more traditional leaf vegetables, but exploitation of their rich nutrition is difficult, primarily because of their high fiber

Dietary fiber

Dietary fiber, sometimes called "roughage", is the indigestible portion of plant foods that pushes food through the digestive system, absorbing water and easing defecation....
content. This obstacle can be overcome by further processing

Food processing

Food processing is the set of methods and techniques used to transform raw ingredients into food or to transform food into other forms for ingestion by humans or animals either in the home or by the food industry....
such as drying and grinding into powder or pulping and pressing for juice.

During the first half of the 20th century many grocery stores with vegetable sections sold small bunches of herbs tied with a string to small green and red peppers known as "potherbs."

Nutrition

Leaf vegetables are typically low in calories, low in fat

Fat

Fats consist of a wide group of compounds that are generally soluble in organic solvents and largely insoluble in water. Chemistry, fats are generally ester of glycerol and fatty acids....
, high in protein

Protein

Proteins are organic compounds made of amino acids arranged in a linear chain and joined together by peptide bonds between the carboxyl and amino groups of adjacent amino acid Residue ....
per calorie, high in dietary fiber

Dietary fiber

Dietary fiber, sometimes called "roughage", is the indigestible portion of plant foods that pushes food through the digestive system, absorbing water and easing defecation....
, high in iron

Iron

Iron is a chemical element with the symbol Fe and atomic number 26. Iron is a Group 8 element and period 4 element. Iron is lustrous and silvery in color....
and calcium

Calcium

Calcium is the chemical element with the symbol Ca and atomic number 20. It has an atomic mass of 40.078 amu. Calcium is a soft grey alkaline earth metal, and is the fifth most abundant element by mass in the earth's Crust ....
, and very high in phytochemical

Phytochemical

Phytochemicals are plant-derived chemical compounds under scientific research for their potential health-promoting properties. Phytochemicals are non-essential nutrients, but still they have been scientifically confirmed as being important to human health....
s such as vitamin C

Vitamin C

Vitamin C or ascorbic acid is an essential nutrient for humans, a large number of simian species, a small number of other mammalian species , a few species of birds, and some fish....
, carotenoids, lutein

Lutein

Lutein is one of over 600 known naturally occurring carotenoids. Found in green leafy vegetables such as spinach and kale, lutein is employed by organisms as an antioxidant and for blue light absorption....
and folic acid

Folic acid

Folic acid and Folate are forms of the water-soluble B vitamins. Vitamin B9 is essential to numerous bodily functions ranging from nucleotide synthesis to the remethylation of homocysteine....
.

Preparation

Most leaf vegetables can be eaten raw, for example in sandwich

Sandwich

A sandwich is a food item made of one or more slices of bread with one or more layers of a filling. The bread can be used as is, or it can be coated with butter, vegetable oil, mustard or other condiments to enhance flavour and texture....
es or salad

Salad

Salad is a mixture of cold or hot foods, usually including vegetables and/or fruits, often with a dressing, occasionally nuts or croutons, and sometimes with the addition of meat, fish, pasta, cheese, eggs, or whole grains....
s. Leafy greens can be used to wrap other ingredients like a tortilla

Tortilla

This aticle contains information about corn tortilla.For fluor tortilla, see: Flour tortilla For spanish tortilla, see: Tortilla_de_patatas...
. They may also be stir-fried

Stir frying

Stir frying is an umbrella term used to describe two fast cooking techniques: chao and b?o . The term stir-fry was introduced into the English language by Buwei Yang Chao, in her book How to Cook and Eat in Chinese, to describe the chao technique....
, stew

Stew

A stew is a combination of solid food ingredients that have been cooked in liquid and served in the resultant gravy.Ingredients in a stew can include any combination of vegetables , meat, poultry, sausages and seafood....
ed or steam

Steaming

Steaming is a method of cooking using steam. Steaming is considered a relatively healthier cooking technique and capable of cooking almost all kinds of food....
ed. Leaf vegetables stewed with pork

Pork

Pork is the culinary name for meat from the domestic pig . The word, pork, is often meant to denote specifically the fresh meat of the pig, but it can be used as an all-inclusive term, to include cured, smoked, or processed meats It is one of the most-commonly consumed meats worldwide, with evidence of pig animal husbandry dating back...
are a traditional dish in soul food

Soul food

Soul food is an American cuisine, a selection of foods, and is the traditional cuisine of African-Americans of the Southern United States and of black communities beyond....
, and southern U.S. cuisine. They are also commonly eaten in a variety of South Asian dishes such as Saag

Saag

Saag is a Spinach and Mustard plant based curry dish eaten in India and Pakistan with bread such as roti or naan. Saag can be made from spinach, mustard plant, or other leaf vegetable, along with added spices and sometimes other ingredients....
.

Leaf vegetable

Nutrition

Preparation

See also