Plant Fennel

Spice:

Fennel

Botanical Name:

Foeniculum vulgare

Botany:

Foeniculum vulgare is a perennial herb. The stem is hollow, erect, and glaucous green, and it can grow up to 2.5 metres (8 feet) tall. The leaves grow up to 40 centimetres (16 inches) long; they are finely dissected, with the ultimate segments filiform (threadlike), about 0.5 millimetres (1⁄64 in) wide. Its leaves are similar to those of dill, but thinner. The flowers are produced in terminal compound umbels 5–17.5 cm (2–7 in) wide, each umbel section having 20–50 tiny yellow flowers on short pedicels. The fruit is a dry schizocarp from 4–10 mm (3⁄16–3⁄8 in) long, half as wide or less, and grooved. Since the seed in the fruit is attached to the pericarp, the whole fruit is often mistakenly called "seed."

Cultivation:

Fennel is widely cultivated, both in its native range and elsewhere, for its edible, strongly flavored leaves and fruits. Its aniseed or liquorice flavor comes from anethole, an aromatic compound also found in anise and star anise, and its taste and aroma are similar to theirs, though usually not as strong. Florence fennel (Foeniculum vulgare Azoricum Group; syn. F. vulgare var. azoricum) is a cultivar group with inflated leaf bases which form a bulb-like structure. It is of cultivated origin, and has a mild anise-like flavor but is sweeter and more aromatic. Florence fennel plants are smaller than the wild type. Several cultivars of Florence fennel are also known by several other names, notably the Italian name finocchio. In North American supermarkets, it is often mislabeled as "anise." Foeniculum vulgare 'Purpureum' or 'Nigra', "bronze-leaved" fennel, is widely available as a decorative garden plant. Fennel has become naturalized along roadsides, in pastures, and in other open sites in many regions, including northern Europe, the United States, southern Canada, and much of Asia and Australia. It propagates well by both root crown and seed and is considered an invasive species and a weed in Australia and the United States. It can drastically alter the composition and structure of many plant communities, including grasslands, coastal scrub, riparian, and wetland communities. It appears to do this by outcompeting native species for light, nutrients, and water and perhaps by exuding allelopathic substances that inhibit the growth of other plants. In western North America, fennel can be found from the coastal and inland wildland-urban interface east into hill and mountain areas, excluding desert habitats. On Santa Cruz Island, California for example, fennel has achieved 50 to 90% absolute cover.

Wikipedia URL:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fennel