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How effective is boiling something to break down the cyanogenic glycosides within?

Asked by El_Cadejo (34610points) June 27th, 2011

So I have two passion flower plants now. Ive been reading for a while about how they make for a really good sleep aid as well as help with muscle spasms. Considering I can never sleep at night because of muscle spasms this is something id like to try.

The problem is I’ve been reading that most species and the one I have in particular contains cyanogenic glycosides. Now I know these can be found in most foods and isnt really a problem but I couldnt quite find any data saying exactly how much could be found in passion flowers.

From what Ive read when the plant is heated it breaks the cyanogenic glycosides down into free hydrogen cyanide that will evaporate off. (yay well ventilated rooms :P)

The question is, how efficient is this process? Will it remove most of the cyanide from the plant if I do boil it for a long time? Is there another method that would work better?

Ideally i’d like to make passion flower tea. I just dont want a tea thats to die for.
sorry couldnt resist that one :P

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