Ferula foetida Seeds | Asafoetida
LATIN NAME: Ferula foetida
COMMON NAME: Asafoetida
Plant Profile
Ferula foetida is the name Linnaeus gave in 1753 to the plant behind asafoetida, and for two and a half centuries botanists have argued about whether it is the same species as the Ferula asafoetida of later authors. What grows in the high, cold steppes of northeastern Iran and western Afghanistan is a compact umbellifer, one to two metres when it flowers, with leaves cut into extremely fine, hair-like segments and umbels of dull yellow flowers. It is smaller and neater than its better-known cousin, and it flowers earlier in the season. The root crown, sliced and dried, gives the same pungent resin. In the wild it grows on stony, gypsiferous ground where few other umbellifers survive.
Science & Biotechnology
Much of the taxonomic confusion comes from the fact that the resin of commerce has been traded for at least three thousand years, along routes that mix material from several Ferula species, so the plant named from a specimen and the plant named from a drug were never quite the same thing. Modern work uses chromosome counts and DNA barcoding to separate them: F. foetida tends to have finer leaf dissection, smaller mericarps and a different array of coumarins. The gum-resin is a complex of ferulic acid esters, umbelliprenin and sulfur-bearing disulfides, and the ratio of these compounds is what distinguishes a good sample from a poor one in the spice trade. Seed biology papers note that the mericarps carry a thin oil layer that turns rancid quickly, which explains the poor germination of stored seed.
Uses & Benefits
This is the asafoetida of the Iranian and Afghan bazaars, sold as a lump resin, as a pale powder cut with rice flour, or as a compounded mixture for domestic use. In Persian cooking it appears in khoresht and in the pickles of the north, always in small quantity and always cooked in oil first. Herbalists in the region use it for flatulence, for colic in children and as a rub for chest colds, and the plant has a place in Unani and Ayurvedic formularies under the name hingu. Growers outside its range value it as a dry-garden ornamental with an unusually long taproot, useful on a hot slope where irrigation is impossible. The smell when the root is damaged is memorable, and not everyone wants it near the house.
Growing from Seed
This species wants a cold winter and a baking summer, which is hard to fake in a mild climate. Sow in late autumn into deep tubes filled with a mixture of coarse sand, grit and sieved loam, one seed per tube, two centimetres down. Leave the tubes outdoors through winter so the seed gets the freeze it needs, and protect them from mice. Germination is usually in the second spring. The first year produces a single cotyledon and a thin root; do not move it. Plant out in a raised bed of gritty, low-nutrient soil in full sun. Water only in the first summer, then leave it to the rain. Flowering comes in the fourth or fifth year, and the plant dies afterwards.
Our Take
The original asafoetida of the botanists: smaller, sharper and neater than its cousin, and strictly for a garden with a real winter.
Related Reading
Gardeners who grow Asafoetida often pair it with these related subjects: