Ban Lan Gen Tincture & Alcohol-Free Extract

Ban Lan Gen (Isatis tinctoria, including the plants long called Isatis indigotica), known in Europe as woad, is a biennial of the mustard family, Brassicaceae, native from the Caucasus and Central Asia across to the Mediterranean and long cultivated in China, especially Hebei, Jiangsu, and Anhui. In its first year it forms a rosette of blue-green, lance-shaped leaves; in the second it sends up a branched stem 50 to 120 centimeters tall crowded with small bright yellow four-petaled flowers, followed by flat, dark, pendulous pods. The leaves were the blue dye plant of medieval Europe. The long, cylindrical taproot is grey-yellow outside and yellowish-white inside. We extract the dried root.