Health benefits of Chayote

Chayote is a roughly pear-shaped, mild flavored vegetable grown worldwide for its delicious seeds, roots, shoots, flowers, leaves and fruit. Almost all parts are consumed raw in salad, boiled, marinated or fried.  It is a copper and vitamin B6 rich vegetable which is consumed worldwide to gain more benefits and remains healthy.

• Leaves and fruit have laxative, diuretic, cardiovascular and anti-inflammatory properties.
• Decoctions made from the leaves or fruits are used to relieve urine retention and burning during urination as well as to dissolve kidney stones and to assist in the treatment of arteriosclerosis and hypertension.
• Raw pulp of the fruit is calming for skin rashes and roasted leaves used in the suppuration of boils.
• Herbal tea made with chayote leaves is used for lowering high blood pressure, dissolving kidney stones and treating atherosclerosis, or even hardening of the arteries.
• A tea containing the flesh of chayote squash has mild diuretic properties and is used for treating bloating in certain parts of the world.

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How to Eat

• Tuberous roots, fruit, young leaves, shoots and stems are edible.
• Fruit, stems and young leaves and tuber roots are consumed as a vegetable, both alone and plain boiled, as well as an ingredient of plentiful stews.
• Chayote fruit are eaten raw in salads and salsas, but are more often cooked by sautéing or baking or stuffed or boiling, mashed, scalloped, fried or pickled.
• Fruits are used in curries as well.
• Fruit can be halved and bake like a winter squash and serve with butter.
• Peeled sections of the fruit can be cubed for frying or used in soups.
• Due to softness of the flesh, the fruit are used for baby and children’s food, juices, sauces as well as pasta dishes.
• Fully grown light green fruit is cooked as vegetables in China.
• Young fruit and tendriled shoots are used in sayur or are boiled as lalab in Indonesia.
• Fruits are made into kolek.
• Tubers taste like sweet potatoes so cooked as huwi boled and eaten as a delicacy.
• Seeds are edible and are fried or roasted.
• Seeds can be sautéed in butter as a delicacy.
• Chayote is extensively grown for its edible shoot, known as lóng xü cài in Taiwan.
• Shoot is a commonly consumed vegetable in Vietnam and Thailand.
• Teas are prepared from the leaves.
• The large storage roots signify a rich source of starch and are eaten.
• 2 years old tubers from vines are boiled, candied or roasted like potatoes.
• Tubers are eaten like potatoes as well as other root vegetables.
• Shoots and leaves are often consumed in salads and stir fries, especially in Asia.
• Chayote is used in many kinds of dishes such as stir-fried vegetables, soup and chop suey in Philippines.
• Chayote is generally stir-fried in China.
• It is breaded and fried, or used cooked in salads, soups and soufflés in Brazil and other Latin American countries.
• Raw mirlitons cut into chunks/cubes are included in fruit, and vegetable salads.
• In France, it is used as a substitute of artichoke hearts.
• In Puerto Rico, matured fruit are halved and boiled. Seeds are also eaten.
• In India, chayote is consumed with other vegetables in curried dish.

Other Facts

• Starchy tuberous roots and vines are used as cattle fodder.
• Fruit and roots are not only used as food but also as fodder for cattle in America and India.
• Due to its flexibility and strength of the stem fibers, they are used as Reunion, in handicrafts to make baskets and hats.
• Chayote plants are used efficiently in mixed plantations designed specifically for soil recovery and/or conservation in Philippines.
• Flowers are good nectar sources for bees.

Precautions

• Chayote pears exude clear latex like liquid particularly while peeling that can cause peculiar tingling sensation and numbness in handling parts.

Chayote – Sechium edule Facts

Chayote also known as Chaco, Choko is a perennial, monoecious climbing vine which is native to cool mountains of Central America. It prefers well-drained, deep, moist, fertile soil rich in organic matter. It is full of important nutrients like protein, dietary fiber, carbohydrate, vitamins like Vitamin B1, B2, B3, C, E and K and several mineral and amino acids which are extremely for our health.

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