It’s one of the great hidden secrets in the food industry today – that marshmallows no longer contain a single ounce of marshmallow.
How can that be possible? Wouldn’t there simply be an empty space where the squares used to be? What we mean is that marshmallow no longer contains the marshmallow root.
This is the original plant, a 90-120cm tall plant with pink flowers that dwells in wetlands such as marshes, misty bogs, and riverbanks. Back in the 1800s, Frenchmen peeled back the plant’s bark to reveal a white pulp within. They boiled it to soften the texture and release sweetness, and after whisking in sugar and egg whites, they had created pâte de guimauve, a spongy, sugary dessert served in Parisian cafes.
This was the first modern marshmallow treat. It became wildly popular across Europe, with endless varieties like chocolate-coated mallow cups springing up. Its flexibility was endless, but by the early 1900s, manufacturers had grown frustrated with the two day boiling and drying process. Hence, they removed the marshmallow root and replaced it with gelatin. The health benefits were lost, but they had finally created the wildly popular snack of today.
The acne connection
Modern marshmallows are probably the square-shaped object that’s most likely to cause acne. It’s a sugary white puff with an average of 4 ingredients, which are finely tuned to create a rush of pleasure to the consumer and the rush of profits to the manufacturer’s bank account. One common ingredient is high fructose corn syrup.
But marshmallow root is a completely different animal; it’s a whole plant with many natural compounds. Like licorice root, many acne patients have experimented with it, and others are daydreaming about the possibilities.
The marshmallow root contains luteolin, phenolic antioxidants, beta-sitosterol, lanosterol and altheacalamene, and that’s only the identified compounds.
Unsurprisingly, marshmallow has no direct studies on acne, acne bacteria, or oily skin. Not all herbs do; we can’t be too greedy. But what’s weird is the lack of studies on the root causes as well. There’s only scraps on chronic inflammation or oxidative stress, despite marshmallow being an ever present herb through history.
Mood busting or stress studies are a distant dream. There’s often fatal flaws, as this study found nice accelerations in wound healing after 3 days in mice, and reductions in staphylococcus aureus bacteria. The problem is that marshmallow leaf was tested. It’s a promising study in its own right, but marshmallow root is easily the more popular supplement.
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Luckily, marshmallow root is saved from oblivion with two promising powers, the first being unexpected and previously undocumented: UV radiation protection.
ONE: 20 rabbits were gathered (probably lured in by carrots Bugs Bunny style). A marshmallow root ointment was forged, and when applied, it reduced the skin inflammation trigged by UV radiation by 20%. It almost matched dexamathasone, a catabolic steroid which is among the stronger anti-inflammatory drugs prescribed by doctors. These great results took 3 weeks to manifest. Combining the two was more effective than dexamathasone alone. The study was discussed in this 2013 paper.
TWO: a human study, and thus on another level of usefulness. Marshmallow was compared to Astragulus membranaceus, a Chinese medicinal herb. In a lung cell test, commercial grown marshmallow held back the damage of UV radiation for 12 minutes before it finally broke through. A greenhouse grown marshmallow root was even better, holding back the damage for 15 minutes.
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But this was a mere dress rehearsal, as the next test was on skin cells. Both forms of marshmallow prevented UVA radiation damage to DNA, and better, the reductions were statistically significant. The skin cells were isolated cells rather than attached to a living human being, but the scientists recommended further skincare studies on marshmallow root. They also detected the antioxidant luteolin (the signature antioxidant of celery), and “several unidentified flavonoid-like compounds”. Astragulus membranaceus was dismissed as a failure, proving that the scientists were hard-headed realists and not overoptimistic about everything.
The best feature of the studies is that whole, unprocessed marshmallow root succeeded rather than isolated compounds. This explains why Ancient Egyptians were able to simply pick the root.
There’s two downsides. Firstly, the studies were topical, although the compounds responsible could easily migrate to the skin, like carotenoids in carrots (which cause the orange skin from overdoses). Secondly, the studies measured damage to DNA, but not how quickly they recovered from damage.
The evidence is far from conclusive, but marshmallow root could strengthen your acne against the warping radiation of sunlight, the radiation you walk through daily.
The long history of marshmallow root
Marshmallow might be the herb with the biggest gap between its non-existent acne evidence and glowing historical anecdotes.
The first such fact is that the botanical name althea is sourced from the Greek word altheo, which literally translates as “to cure” or “to heal”.
We’re already off to good start, and the textbook references date back to Ancient Egypt, where pharaohs ate a mixture of mallow, grains, nuts and honey as a delicacy, while deeming it strictly off limits to ordinary citizens. More relevantly, both the Ancient Greeks and Egyptians considered mallow beneficial for soar throats and indigestion.
The Romans were particularly fond of marshmallow. Some agreed with the Egyptian theory of sore throats, while Hippocrates recommended a mallow root concoction for bleeding wounds and bruises.
Centuries later, the Greek physician Dioscorides recommended marshmallow as a poison, vomiting, bite and insect sting antidote. By the middle ages, starving peasants were were boiling marshmallow roots and frying them with onions in butter. The root had spread to India, and Ayurvedic medicine declared marshmallow to be cooling and moistening.
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By the 10th century, Arab physicians were applying marshmallow leaf for skin inflammation, interestingly for acne patients. Marshmallow was a favourite of early US colonies, was listed in the prestigious US Pharmacopoeia, and in the early days of 1800s marshmallow treats, its throat soothing properties aided its roaring success.
What conclusions can we draw? Ailments like insect bites aren’t strictly related to acne, but they share the inflammation and swelling. If Middle Easterners used marshmallow for skin inflammation, then it’s highly likely that neighbouring empires did the same, unless they were desperate to keep a secret for their people. The soar throat remedy surfaces most frequently, and is most likely due to the mucilage content, but may indicate further anti-inflammatory powers.
The most important lesson for acne is simple: marshmallow has survived as a medicinal plant for thousands of years.
Mucilage and how it affects the human body
If you scan health and acne websites though, by far the most frequently mentioned feature of marshmallow root is mucilage.
Mucilage is a specific type of plant fiber, comprised of complex polysaccharides including sugars like arabinose, pyranose, galatose, rhamnose and furanose. Mucilage is found in many plants, but particularly flax and chia seeds, plantains, licorice root, marshmallow root, figs, fermented soy, and psyllium. Two roles of mucilage in plants are resisting drought and attaching to soil particles to germinate.
Mucilage swells up and becomes gelatinous when mixed with water, which is why many paleo recipes use chia seeds or flax seeds to create the correct texture. The gooiness of the soy dish natto is down to mucilage. The old glues made from marshmallow root were possible because of the mucilage.
For health, this mucilage can form a protective film on surfaces like the throat, and soothe any pain there. But many believe that this applies to the gut as well, and a malfunctioning gut is one of the great underestimated causes of acne.
We begin with a study on the prickly pear cactus. In the human colon, its mucilage was shown to increase beneficial lactobacilli by 25% and bifidobacterium by a slight amount. These species are the main groups of beneficial gut bacteria. Inflammatory bacteria were also suppressed by about 4%, including enterococci, enterobacteria, staphylococci, and clostridia.
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One of the classic benefits also manifested: a 50% increase in butyrate, a short chain fatty acid churned out by beneficial species (which is also found in butter). Butyrate protects the gut lining and shields against colon cancer, but it also lowers inflammation across the wider body. Better yet, the butyrate spike didn’t immediately disappear when the mucilage was discontinued.
However, that’s only one study. This experiment on flax seed mucilage was more mixed, as in obese women, there was significant shift towards inflammatory gut bacteria species overall. Over 30 bacterial species were examined. Making matters worse, butyrate fell. This opens up an annoying contradiction, but luckily, the scientists mentioned how flax seed fibers are known to generate less butyrate compared to similar fibers.
Then there’s insulin and blood sugar. The flax mucilage study detected a significant improvement in insulin sensitivity, although the bacteria that normally improve insulin sensitivity like F. prausnitzii failed to multiply. The mucilage must have had a secret pathway.
This study, meanwhile, gave 18 young either a high mucilage meal or low mucilage meal, and the former resulted in smaller and slower insulin spikes. Less insulin equals less oily skin (blood sugar behaves similarly), and hunger hormones like ghrelin were also reduced. The patients reported higher satiety overall.
Elsewhere, there’s numerous studies demonstrating that mucilage can slow blood sugar spikes (here, here and here). The theory is simple: mucilage fibers are viscous and soluble, and physically delay gastric emptying, the absorption of glucose through the gut lining.
Finally, we have a study on inflammation, where fenugreek mucilage was fed to rats with arthritis. The inflammatory biomarkers COX-2 and C-reactive protein fell, while vitamin C, glutathione and antioxidant enzyme levels all increased. Swelling of the rats’ paws calmed, reaching maximum effect after 21 days, while their joints appeared to be less painful. Inflammation is a huge cause of frail and painful bones, but it’s just as important for red and angry acne.
Marshmallow mucilage – the key to everything?
Mucilage is looking promising indeed, but it’s possible that the powers are specific to fenugreek or flaxseed mucilage. Perhaps the sugar profiles are different, or perhaps there’s other beneficial compounds wrapped up inside the mucilage’s structure…
…but luckily, we have just one study on marshmallow root mucilage itself.
The study tested epithelial cells, the bricks that make up your gut lining, which regulates the absorption of healthy nutrient into the bloodstream, while denying access to inflammatory molecules. Promisingly for acne, a whole marshmallow root extract increased epithelial cell proliferation, as did isolated mucilage polysaccharides. The scientists even detected improvements at the genetic level, with the cell adhesion and cell growth genes accelerating.
The mechanism of this power is a mystery. It could be more direct, from a soothing coating of mucilage, but it could be from indirectly fuelling beneficial bacteria which do the work themselves.
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For example, this study discovered that bifidobacterium breve slowed the shedding of living epithelial cells. This study found that bifidobacterium and lactobacilli churn out metabolites like acetate, which protect the human epithelial cell from the pro-inflammatory chemical TNF-a. Marshmallow mucilage many have double gut-strengthening powers.
There’s clues in the dusty textbooks of Ancient Egypt, as they favoured marshmallow root for indigestion, and this belief persisted until the 19th century.
As for blood sugar, the method of physically delaying the glucose’s absorption is very basic. It’s fundamental to mucilage, and should pass onto marshmallows. Boosting insulin sensitivity is more mysterious though, as it’s more likely to be down to specific compounds, which only flax seeds may possess. We can’t make a simple assumption.
The verdict
Right now, marshmallow root is fairly weak acne supplement, at least compared to ginseng or MSM. There’s great potential, but scientists haven’t delved deep into its many secrets yet.
There’s probably antioxidants and anti-inflammatory powers, but we can’t be sure of their strength. The sunscreen powers are a standout compared to other herbs, but the evidence isn’t overwhelming yet – I’d prioritise adding a serving of carrots over taking marshmallow root.
Instead, the best feature to file away in your memory banks is undoubtedly the gut-healing powers. Even this power isn’t proven, but the mucilage rumours seem to have a glimmer of truth, and it’s supported by the ancient wisdom of Ancient Egypt and other civilisations. This is the power we’ll be watching in the years ahead – marshmallow root could turn into the top obscure supplement for acne patients with gut woes.
For now, marshmallow root is spinning its wheels in the category of “experimental supplement”.
NEXT: forget creams and moisturisers – discover the ultimate acne-clearing diet
Thanks for reading!