Yeah i tried to explain this all before(many herxes ago). There are many ways to make an extract of YU Xing Cao. The perticular company that makes the extract for Zhangs is roughly a 1:8-1:10 ratio. Their process involves a dry extract process utilizing corn starch(long technical story). Hepapro has a more technical term for the corn starch on the label(vegatable stearin or cellulose). They are most likely the only ones in china that make it this certain way which does maintain all the proper chemicals found in the herb. Perticularly the fishy smelling aldehyde type crystals found on the outside of the leaves and inside of the plant. I used to be in contact with this company in china and their minumum order was 50 kilos of the hepapro type Yu Xing Cao. I have since lost the email and phone #'s because at the time of my research, there was no clear answer as to how well the hhcapsules work. It would have been a risky investment for myself and my company to order such a large quanity of a material that is yet to be proven. According to the price of the real yu xing cao from this company. I estimated Zhangs actual product cost at $1.50(including bottle and label).

The other extracts from 1stchineseherbs etc that utilize a different process are evident from simple examination. They use an alcohol gas extraction process which loses many of the important chemicals that come form the plant. These other extracted versions are more pleasant on the tongue and have a more cinnamon smell to them. I'm just not 100% sure if they perform like the hepapro type Houttuynia.