Botanical name: Piper longum-Fructus
Other names: Long pepper, pimpli, pipal
Family: Piperaceae
Part used: seed
Taste (rasa): pungent
Characteristic (guna): oily, light, penetrating
Energy (veerya): mildly heating, not hot
Post digestive effect (vipak): sweet
Dosha effect: VK-, P+
Action (karma): enkindles the digestive fire, digests toxins, destroys toxins, purgative, scratches toxins from the tissues, vermifuge, reduces fat tissue, alleviates skin diseases, benefits breathing, clears toxins from the head, alleviates hiccups, mitigates fevers, aphrodisiac, rejuvenative specifically to plasma, blood, fat and reproductive tissues, improves the intellect, digestive stimulant, carminative, expectorant, bronchodilatator, anthelmintic,
analgesic, circulatory stimulant.
 
Dose:  1-5 grams per day of powder.  Due to safety issues do not use at a high dose (>5 grams per day) for long periods of time.  Low dose is safe for long-term use as attested to by the vast amount of Ayurvedic formulas containing pippali.
 
Contraindications: Excess pitta and inflammations of the intestines.
Pippali is accepted as an Ayurvedic herb that increases digestion without causing excessive heat.  A wonderful pepper, which eats phlegm is becoming a household word in Australia.  Some Ayurvedic fanatics carry them in every pocket to aid digestion! the powder can be sprinkled on raw fruit for a better digestio.
Pippali (long pepper) is medicinal pepper; cleanser and tonic for the lungs, it stimulates slow digestion, it tonifies the reproductive tissues, it is blood building, and it feeds the brain.  Pippali can also help destroy and digest toxins.  Grind and use instead of pepper (it is hot but less hot than black pepper).  Used to help digestion, clear the lungs and to make chai tea.
 
Pippali is accepted as an Ayurvedic herb that increases digestion without causing excessive heat.  A wonderful pepper, which eats phlegm is becoming a household word in Australia.  Some Ayurvedic fanatics carry them in every pocket to aid digestion! The powder can be sprinkled on raw fruit for a better digestion.
 
Lungs: Primarily used for cold, wet and mucousy conditions fo the lungs.  It is a rejuvenative for the lungs.  It encourages vasodilation and therefore increases circulation, specifically to the lungs.  Use mixed with honey in asthma, bronchitis, pneumonia and compromised immunity in the respiratory system to reduce kapha.
 
Digestion: Used to stimulate agni and clear weak digestion with symptoms of nausea, slow digestion, flatulence with a cold and painful abdomen.  In mal-absorption it can increase assimilation of nutrients.
 
Reproduction: Its sweet post-digestive effect points to its ability to tonify the sukra dhatu and reproductive tissue, which is useful in infertility, impotency and premature ejaculation.
 
Circulation: Its pungency and sweetness invigorate blood and nourish rakta.  By enhancing the digestive fire in the tissues it is helps to assimiliate more nutrients for building the plasma and the blood.  It can also help to penetrate the cold pain of sciatica.
 
Liver: It has a hepatoprotective effect that may benefit fibrosis.
Nerves: Its ability to nourish majja dhatu, due to its sweet vipaka, helps in vata disorders and also to nourish the brain.
 
Ref: ‘Ayurvedic Medicine’ by Sebastian Pole; ‘Ayurvedic Pharmacology & Therapeutic Uses of Medicinal Plants’ by Vaidya V.M. Gogte; ‘Yogi of Herbs’ by V. Lad & D. Frawley