What is Moringa?
Moringa is a small leafy tree that originated from India and growing increasingly famous around the world because of its high nutritional value and potent anti-inflammatory and antioxidant properties. Welcome to Moringa.Works – a website dedicated to the Moringa tree and maintained by O. M. Jonathan. Continue reading…
The moringa tree goes under numerous appearances and is called the horseradish tree, ben tree, or drumstick tree.
There are 13 kinds of species; however, the most generally cultivated is the Moringa oleifera; a little tree from India, Pakistan, and Nepal but its use has extended to Eastern nations for the treatments and prevention of diseases.
Moringa oleifera trees rapidly grow and can reach a height of 10–12 m (32–40 ft) with trunk measurement of 45 cm (1.5 ft). The bark has a whitish-dim color and surrounded by thick cork. Its shoots have purplish or greenish-white hairy bark. The tree has delicate branches, and the leaves develop feathery foliage.
The flowers of the moringa tree are about 1.0 to 1.5 centimeters, half inches long, and 2.0 cm in width. They look like bisexual and fragrant, yellowish-white, narrow veined, encompassed by five unequal petals. They develop on thin stalks in spreading or hanging flowers groups with a length of about 10 to 25 centimeters.
Flowering starts barely six months after planting. In seasonally cold regions, flowering occurs annually, usually around April and June whereas flowering can happen twice or even all through the year in areas with more constant seasonal temperatures and with continuous rainfall.
The fruit is a hanging, three-sided darker capsule of about 20 to 45 cm size which holds dim brown colored, globular seeds with a width about 1 cm. Its seeds have three whitish papery wings and quickly scattered by wind and water.
During cultivation, it is often cut back annually to 1–2 m (3–6 ft) and allowed to re-grow, so the pods and leaves remain within arm’s reach.
Why is Moringa Widely Regarded as a Superfood?
Moringa is a highly nutritional food; hence commonly called a “superfood.” With about seven times the vitamin C found in orange, four times the calcium and twice the quantity of protein found in milk, four times more vitamin A found in carrots, and three times more potassium found in a banana. The leaves of Moringa tree recorded a score 157,000 of ORAC (Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity) – more than most antioxidant superfoods that are traditionally used, including Acai berries, blueberries, pomegranates, green tea, dark chocolate, red wine, goji berries, and garlic. Moringa trees keep people healthy in places where they can’t afford the standard pharmaceutical privilege. This tree is commonly known as “vitamin tree” because it has a fresh burst of vitamins and nutrients in a single handful and this encourages people to reach up and pull the young leaves off moringa trees for chewing.
Moringa oleifera is the most widely harvested species of all moringa family with 13 species grown in tropical and subtropical climates. Each of the species is unique, ranging from tall trees to tiny plants.
What is its Usefulness?
For at least 4,000 years, serves a host of medicinal purposes (and as food). Little wonder it is called “Miracle-Moringa.”
- Moringa can suppress obesity and is known as an anti-diabetic supplement with the ability to fight Type 2 diabetes.
- Moringa leaves are known to be effective in lowering blood sugar levels.
- It is beneficial for the prevention of hyperglycemia and hypercholesterolemia.
- With the high presence of iron in the leaves (31% Daily Value per 100 g consumed, table), it is used to prevent anemia.
- The leaves protect the liver and cleanse the body of toxins.
- Research has shown moringa to be effective in fighting cancer.
- It is highly nutritional, full of essential amino acids, antioxidants, protein, and so forth.
Moringa is an excellent source for protein, having 18 out of the 20 amino acids, including the nine most essential amino acids. It makes it highly beneficial for gym enthusiasts for muscle building.
Methanolic an extract of M. oleifera reduces serum glucose and nitric oxide and increases serum insulin and also increases protein level.
Moringa helps to fight skin infections or scurvy because it has anti-bacterial and anti-inflammatory characteristics. It clots and improves healing for wounds or bites and stops bleeding.
With its anti-bacterial and cardioprotective property, it fights H. Pylori bacteria, a known cause for stomach ulcer.
Moringa flowers make an excellent recipe for tea and are believed to fight off colds.
With its anti-inflammatory function, it’s believed moringa can fight inflammation in the body, which can lead to cardiovascular disease and chronic disease like diabetes.
Moringa is a natural adaptogen meaning that it increases the body’s resistance to stress by putting a balance to the body’s cortisol levels. Together with its protein content, each leaf is also a source of iron, calcium, and vitamins E, K, and A. They’re also rich in fiber, which supports your gut, and Sainsbury’s say that moringa has six times the antioxidants of goji berries.
Traditional Uses
The use of moringa extends to tradition medicinal purpose and creating a nickname of sort- ‘tree of life’ because every part of the tree is consumable. The pods, seeds, flowers, and leaves are used as foods, while the root, bark, stems, and the rest of the tree come handy in tools making and serves as medicine for various ailments.
Malnutrition Expulsion
Moringa trees have been used to fight malnutrition, especially among nursing mothers and infants. Since moringa grows better in semiarid and arid circumstance, it is likely to provide a vast nutritional source all year long.
Because its leave has a rich source of iron, it is efficiently used to combat deficiency of iron. However, further research is needed to test practical applications of using this dietary source and its iron bioavailability.
Culinary Uses
Moringa has various applications in cooking. The fruits or seed pods also called “drumsticks,” are a culinary vegetable commonly utilized in soups and curries. The leaves have a variety of culinary usage, and the flowers are eaten raw in a salad.
The long drumsticks are sliced and used as ingredients in soups and curries. Since the outer skin is intense and sinewy, drumsticks are regularly bitten to remove the juices and supplements, with the remaining stringy material discarded. Others use a marginally different strategy for sucking delicate seeds and flesh, disposing of the tube of skin.
Traditional dishes like South Indian sambar include drumsticks as an ingredient where it is made a stew with lentils; Thai dish Kaeng som (dry curry with drumsticks and fish) is another dish that utilizes the drumstick.
Depending on how a cook chooses, the leaves can serve as an ingredient, maybe most regularly added to clear juices-based soups, for example, the Filipino dishes Tinola and Utan. Delicate moringa leaves, finely slashed, are utilized as a garnish for vegetable dishes and salad, for instance, the Kerala dish Thoran. The leave can serve the purpose or taken together with coriander.
Water Purification
Moringa seed cake, gotten as a remnant from squeezing seeds to get oil, is utilized to purify water using flocculation to produce drinkable water for animal or human consumption. Moringa seeds contain dimeric cationic proteins which ingest and kill colloidal charges in turbid water, making the colloidal particles cluster together, causing the suspended particles removable as slime by either filtration or settling.
Moringa seed cake purifies water. This benefit is exceptionally compelling for being non-toxic and sustainable compared to other materials in moringa-growing regions where drinking water is affected by pollutant.
Moringa Tree Anti-Cancer Benefits
Apart from its immense nutritional benefits, moringa also has several medicinal benefits, perhaps most notably is its stance as an anti-cancer supplement.
In India, its fruit, leaves, flowers, seeds, and roots are used primarily as anti-inflammatory and anti-tumor medicines.
As medical practitioners have long recognized moringa, scientists have been compelled to research its anti-cancer characteristic.
In 2003, the Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention published a study where scientists examined skin tumor prevention by ingesting mice with moringa seedpod extracts. Results showed a dramatic reduction in skin papillomas and suggested that moringa has possible cancer-preventing properties.
Another study that was done in 2006 published that a molecule found in M. oleifera can induce death of cells in ovarian cancer cells grown in a lab. Based on these findings, researchers want to research if the plant has the potential to treat this type of cancer.
Other Uses
Moringa is known to improve nutrition, boost food security, foster rural development, and support sustainable land care. It might be used to feed livestock, a micronutrient fluid, a characteristic anthelmintic, and conceivable adjuvant.
Moringa oleifera leaf powder has the same powerful effect as a cleanser for hand washing when wetted ahead of time to enhance anti-septic and soap properties from phytochemicals present in the leaves. Moringa oleifera press cake seeds have been executed as wastewater conditioners for dewatering and drying fecal slime.
How Do You Eat it?
Almost all parts of the moringa are edible or utilized as ingredients in herbal medicine; this includes the leave, immature seed pods, oil pressed from seeds flowers and roots.
Leaves
The leaves are the most nutritious piece of the plant, loaded with vitamin B, vitamin C, provitamin An as beta-carotene, vitamin K, manganese, and protein, among other fundamental supplements. When contrasted with foods rich in specific supplements per 100 g crisp weight, cooked moringa leaves are a vital source of these equivalent supplements. A portion of the calcium in moringa leaves comes from crystals of calcium oxalate.
The leaves are cooked and utilized like spinach and are regularly dried and squashed into a powder, used as ingredients in soups and sauces.
The easiest way to take moringa is in powder form, made from crushing the naturally dried leaves into a fine dust.
The vibrant green color might look off-putting, but it has a tasty spinach-like flavor that goes great in smoothies, as a flavoring in soups or even taken as a tea.
Immature seed pods
The tender seed pods, called “drumsticks,” are commonly eaten in South Asia. They are set up by parboiling and cooked in a curry until they soften. Even after being boiled, the fruits and seed pod retains its high vitamin C (albeit boiling might reduce the level) content and are also a decent source of dietary fiber, manganese, potassium, and magnesium.
Seeds
The seeds, when extracted from developed pods, can be eaten like peas or roasted and taken like nuts. They contain large amounts of vitamin C and moderate measures of vitamin B as well as dietary minerals.
Seed oil
Developed seeds yield 38–40% consumable oil called ben oil from its large grouping of behenic corrosive. The refined oil is clear and scentless and opposes rancidity. The seed cake staying after oil extraction might be utilized as a fertilizer or as a water purifier. Moringa seed oil likewise has the potential for use as a biofuel.
Roots
Roots serve as a condiment with sharp flavor characteristics gained from the substantial content of polyphenols.
How Much Moringa Supplement Can You Take?
Depending on the size of a capsule, supplements usually have about 300 to 500 milligrams of moringa leaf powder.
The prescribed dosage for adult supplements is two capsules every day, one taken in the morning and one in the night.
However, it is advised you seek the medical advice of a medical practitioner before taking the supplements so that the dosage is appropriate for you or that the supplement will never interact with any other medications you may currently consuming.
Conclusion
Moringa oleifera is famous for its numerous health benefits. Moringa Health Benefits Superfoods is the name it earned by its qualities. It’s called a superfood because most of its parts like the roots, seeds, fruit, and leaves are consumed. Regardless of the eaten part of the tree, It is highly nutritional, full of essential amino acids, high amounts of vitamin C and moderate measures of vitamin B, iron supplement, and other dietary minerals. And it is widely used for medicinal purposes like blood sugar control, anti-cancer and a host of others. Its benefits extend to water purification, detergent, forage for livestock, and so forth.
Research Links
https://articles.mercola.com/vitamins-supplements/moringa-oleifera.aspx https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moringa_oleifera
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