The first item woke me up to the virtues of the lotus plant that is
not used significantly yet in the West.
What peaks my interest is that we have underutilized wetlands in
temperate lands and elsewhere that need to be optimized. Elder
berries and cattails only go so far and do nothing in a few inches of
water. Thus a lotus culture able to handle higher latitude
conditions is an attractive proposition. We even have beavers to
build the paddies for us.
It may even help feed the beavers.
My point is that any small to medium water way attractive to a beaver
can be used to promote a lotus culture. The productivity may even
match most crops even if one only takes the seeds.
Even better there exists a mature market for all the possible
products listed below.
Could a Flower
Outsmart Your Body’s Fat Cells?
I’d heard that in
this faraway island paradise, there’s no word for “diet.”
But I was still surprised to see what my new friends in Bali,
Lelir and Westi, had made us for dinner. I expected them to eat like
birds, but every single dish on the table was rich, creamy or sweet.
My first bite of bubuh
injun had me wondering how in the world the Balinese stay so
slim.
I’d just flown
halfway around the world to see for myself if what I’d been reading
about could possibly be true: Could they eat as much rich food as
they want throughout Bali and still stay naturally thin?
I may have found the
answer hiding in Lelir and Westi’s everyday routines. It’s a
fat-melting flower that’s one of Bali’s best-kept secrets.
And the truth was even
better than I imagined.
You see, Bali is a
place that doesn’t give up its secrets easily. After centuries of
being invaded and conquered by hostile nations, the Balinese have
become fiercely protective of their culture.
That might be why so
few people know the full story behind one of their most celebrated
treasures.
They call it sacred
lotus (Nelumbo nucifera). I saw its large, pink petals blooming above
the surface of freshwater ponds. A few times I saw peddlers selling
its unusual fruit, which grows right in the center of the flower and
looks like the spout of a watering can. But most of the time I saw it
carved into intricate stone statues outside of Hindu temples.
Westi told me that the
sacred lotus represents divine beauty and purity, and has symbolic
importance in the Hindu religion, which most Balinese practice.
Although it seemed to
be everywhere I went on the island, very few outsiders know what this
beautiful flower can really do.
The sacred lotus may
hold the key to helping you achieve accelerated fat reduction.
Researchers were able
to see this at work in a recent animal study. They found that sacred
lotus appears to have slowed down the animals’ natural process of
making new fat cells...and signaled for the breakdown of existing fat
at the same time.1
Sacred lotus seems to
specifically target fatty tissue. It helped keep the animals
from gaining more weight – and many even dropped weight.
Another animal study
suggested that sacred lotus interfered with the body’s digestion
and absorption of fat and carbs. At the same time, it
accelerated the breakdown of fat and helped the body melt it faster.2
These preliminary
results are very exciting and I anticipate that human clinical trials
will show a similar benefit. The results look very promising in my
opinion.
Uses of the Lotus
Plant (wikipedia)
The distinctive dried
seed heads, which resemble the spouts of watering cansphoto, are
widely sold throughout the world for decorative purposes and for
dried flower arranging.
The flowers, seeds,
young leaves, and "roots" (rhizomes) are all edible. In
Asia, the petals are sometimes used for garnish, while the large
leaves are used as a wrap for food, not frequently eaten (for
example, as a wrapper for zongzi). In Korea, the leaves and
petals are used as a tisane.Yeonkkotcha (연꽃차)
is made with dried petals of white lotus and yeonipcha (연잎차)
is made with the leaves. Young lotus stems are used as a
salad ingredient in Vietnamese cuisine.
The rhizome (called ǒu (藕)
in pinyin Chinese, ngau in
Cantonese, bhe in Hindi, renkon (レンコン, 蓮根 inJapanese), yeongeun (연근
in Korean) is used as a vegetable in soups,
deep-fried, stir-fried, and braised dishes and the roots are also
used in traditional Asian herbal medicine. Petals, leaves,
and rhizome can also all be eaten raw, but there is a risk
of parasite transmission (e.g., Fasciolopsis buski): it is
therefore recommended that they be cooked before eating.
Lotus rootlets are
often pickled with rice vinegar, sugar, chili and/or
garlic. It has a crunchy texture with sweet-tangy flavours. In Asian
cuisine, it is popular with salad, prawns, sesame
oil and/or coriander leaves. Lotus roots have been
found to be rich in dietary fiber, vitamin
C, potassium, thiamin,riboflavin, vitamin
B6, phosphorus, copper, and manganese, while very low
in saturated fat.[citation needed]
The stamens can
be dried and made into a fragrant herbal tea called liánhuā
cha (蓮花茶)
in Chinese, or (particularly in Vietnam)[citation needed] used
to impart a scent to tea leaves. The lotus seeds or
nuts (called liánzĭ, 蓮子;
or xian liánzĭ, 鲜莲子,
in Chinese) are quite versatile, and can be eaten raw or dried and
popped like popcorn, phool makhana. They can also be boiled
until soft and made into a paste, or boiled with dried longans and
rock sugar to make a tong sui (sweet soup). Combined with
sugar, lotus seed paste becomes one of the most common
ingredients used in pastries such as mooncakes, daifuku,
and rice flour pudding.[5]
In Vietnam, the bitter
tasting germs of the lotus seeds are also made into a tisane (trà
tim sen).
A unique fabric from
the lotus plant fibers is produced only at Inle lake, Union
of Myanmar and is used for weaving special robes
for Buddha images called kya thingahn (lotus
robe).
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