AKA: Milk Thistle, Blessed Thistle

Planting: Well drained soil in sun, fully hardy annual or biennial, 4-5’.

Harvest: As a vegetable, young leaves, flower buds, and roots are harvested when tender and used fresh. For medicinal use, plants are cut when flowering and seeds are collected when ripe. All parts are dried for use in infusions and tinctures, or for extraction of silymarin.

Culinary: Young leaves, with spines removed, are eaten raw or cooked as a spinach like vegetable. Flower buds can be eaten like mini artichokes. Tender roots of first year plants are similar to salsify.

Medicinal: A bitter, diuretic, tonic herb that regenerates liver cels, stimulates bile flow, increases milk production, and relaxes spasm. Used internally for liver and gall bladder diseases, jaundice, hepatitis, liver damage, cirrhosis, and poisoning (especially by alcohol, drugs, and chemicals), It also minimizes side effects from cancer chemotherapy.

Third Eye Vision:

Seeded: Fall 2008 in A2, E6; transplanted spring 2009 in B6

Links: Wiki

Sources:
The Royal Horticultural Society New Encyclopedia of Herbs and Their Uses (RHS)