Plant of the month 2018 March
The plant of the month: la dong
Some weeks ago, I discovered in a Chinese supermarket in Montpellier some packs of big leaves evidently intended to wrap food for cooking. I only had a name to identify it, la dong.
The identification resulted very quick. Typing la dong on a search engine led me to the page Lá dong on the Vietnamese Wikipedia. I had no need to read Vietnamese, as plants fortunately bear a Latin name, and Vietnamese names were written in bold characters. An exploration of images in Wikimedia Commons allowed me to see which traditional meals were wrapped in such a way before being boiled, such as bánh chưng.
It is a Marantaceae, Stachyphrynium placentarium, the broad leaves of which are 25 to 55 cm long. "Leave" is said lá in Vietnamese. We can also find in supermarkets the leaves of Maranta arundinacea, conditioned in rolls.
You will find the result of my search in the page Stachyphrynium placentarium. No less than 18 species are used worldwide to wrap food : (Feuilles pour papillotes).
This search illustrates one of the best aspects of Internet (and Wikipedia in particular), which allows to get acquainted with the diversity of world human cultures.
Pages have been created only in French for the moment, due to lack of time. You can help us translating!