Coleus Forskohlii: A Mint Family Herb With An Explorer Name

A plant named for a lost explorer

Some plants carry the names of the people who first described them, and Coleus forskohlii has one of the more dramatic namesakes in botany. Peter Forsskal was a Swedish-Finnish naturalist and a student of Carl Linnaeus, the father of modern plant naming.

In 1761, Forsskal joined a Danish scientific expedition to Arabia, one of the most ambitious journeys of its era. The team set out to document the plants, animals and cultures of lands that Europeans barely knew. Forsskal collected thousands of specimens along the way, and he described many plants before his early death in Yemen in 1763.

His notebooks and collections were brought back to Copenhagen by the expedition's survivor, Carsten Niebuhr, and published after his death. The Latin name forskohlii is a version of his surname, a lasting tribute to a young botanist who never came home.

Inside the mint family

Take a leaf from a Coleus forskohlii plant between your fingers and the mint family connection becomes clear. It belongs to the Lamiaceae, the same large family as mint, basil, sage, rosemary, thyme and lavender.

Members of this family are easy to recognize once you know the clues. Stems are often square when you roll them between your fingers. Leaves grow in opposite pairs. And many species carry aromatic oils in tiny glands on their leaves, which is why so many of them smell wonderful when brushed.

The plant is a perennial herb with fleshy, aromatic leaves and clusters of small, pale blue to purple flowers. Its most distinctive feature lies underground, in the thick, tuberous roots that are the part used in traditional preparations.

• Square stems and opposite leaves
• Aromatic oils in the leaves
• Small, two-lipped flowers in clusters

A tangle of names

If you try to look up this plant in a reference book, you may become momentarily confused. Botanists have reclassified it more than once, and you may see it listed under names such as Plectranthus barbatus or Plectranthus forskohlii. Supplement makers have mostly stuck with the older name, Coleus forskohlii, which is why it appears on labels.

It is also unrelated, at least in everyday terms, to the colorful garden coleus that gardeners plant in patio pots for its patterned, colorful leaves. Those belong to a different group that was once lumped in the same genus. The garden plant is grown for decoration, the herb for its roots.

This sort of renaming is common in botany. As scientists study DNA and plant structure more closely, genera get merged and split, and a plant that was filed in one drawer for a century may be moved to another. The plant itself has not changed at all; only the filing system has.

Common names vary by region. In India, the plant is often called makandi, and in other parts of the world it appears under local names that can be difficult to untangle.

A root with a place in Indian tradition

The plant is native to the warm, subtropical regions of India, Nepal and Thailand, and it grows well in dry, sunny hillsides. Folk practice in India has used it for a long time, and Ayurvedic texts mention it by its Sanskrit and regional names.

One of the most charming details is how the roots show up in food. Regional accounts from parts of India describe the small tubers being pickled and served as a condiment, with a pungent, aromatic flavor that pairs well with rice and flatbreads.

Pickling is a wonderful old technique for roots. A jar of salt, oil and spices turns a short-lived harvest into something that can sit on the shelf and brighten a plain meal for months. Many Indian households keep several pickles going at once, each one tied to a season and a family recipe.

Like many roots used in traditional cooking, they were valued first as ordinary household ingredients and only later became interesting to the wider world of botanical products. That is the usual order of things. Food and tradition come first; the labels come last.

Coleus forskohlii in Glyco Barrier

Coleus forskohlii is one of the named ingredients in the proprietary herbal blend of Glyco Barrier. According to the brand, that blend totals 200 mg and contains 20 ingredients, and the amount of each individual ingredient is not disclosed. The named herbs also include Gymnema sylvestre, ginseng root, green tea leaf extract, maca root, astragalus root and cayenne pepper fruit extract, and the formula contains chromium picolinate as well.

The brand presents Glyco Barrier as a natural daily wellness formula that supports everyday balance and steady energy. Coleus forskohlii adds a mint family root with an unusual backstory to the mix.

As always in this series, the point is to explore where the plant comes from and how people have used it, rather than to promise specific outcomes.

The explorer's lesson for a daily routine

Forsskal's expedition teaches a small lesson: curiosity pays off when it is steady and careful. He did not discover anything by rushing. He walked, collected, labeled and recorded, day after day.

A good wellness routine is a bit like that. Small, repeatable actions add up over time. The brand suggests 1 mL of Glyco Barrier, about two droppers full, twice daily, morning and evening, with or without food. A single 2 fl oz bottle holds 60 servings and covers 30 days.

Keep the bottle where you will see it, pair each dose with a habit you already have, and let your plate, your walk and your sleep schedule do their part.

Packs are available as 2 bottles at $79 each, 3 bottles at $69 each or 6 bottles at $49 each, with free shipping, and a 60-day money-back guarantee applies from the original purchase date.