Wuhua Yellow Pear

Last updated 2026-11-14 — The yellow pear is not only highly nutritious. Traditional Chinese medicine regards pears as sweet and cold in nature, with benefits such as moistening the lungs, clearing the heart, relieving coughs, eliminating phlegm, reducing lung heat and excessive internal heat, detoxifying alcohol, alleviating chest tightness and shortness of breath. According to *Compendium of Materia Medica*, it moistens the lungs, cools the heart, eliminates phlegm, reduces fire, and detoxifies sores — it can be used to treat colds, bronchitis, coughs. (Locally, large yellow pears are often used medicinally, especially for their exceptional effectiveness in eliminating phlegm and reducing fire, detoxifying sores, treating colds, bronchitis, and coughs.) It also relieves irritability and thirst, loss of voice, constipation, and helps remove alcohol toxins. (Perhaps this was exactly why, in ancient times, the emperor had the officials of Gaoping County spare no effort to present these pears as tribute every year.) A local saying goes: “In early spring, when toxins are abundant, eating one jin (500g) of pears is more effective than taking a dose of medicine.” Back in those days around March, (if not stored properly, the large yellow pears would “go bad” — using a local term I’m not quite sure how to describe — basically, the pears wouldn’t rot, but similar to how a radish dries out in the middle, what locals call becoming “hollow-hearted.” So, after February, they became even more precious and hard to find.) The large yellow pears were almost sold out and hard to come by. So, whenever someone got to eat one at a farmer’s home, they considered it quite a treasure. Thanks to modern preservation techniques, the difficulty of keeping yellow pears fresh has become a thing of the past — storing them until May Day is no longer a problem.