What is Banana Blossom?
Just like any other bananas grow from blossom, in other words, banana blossom is nothing but the flower, from which bunch of bananas grow.
What makes Banana blossom so special?
Banana blossom is known as a vegetable, but in reality, it is an edible flower. It is a popular part of Indian and South East Asian meals. It is not only tastes delicious, but it is rich in several nutrients like calcium, iron and phosphorous.
Banana blossom preparation
- First, place 2 tbsp of yogurt in a bowl, beat it with a spoon and dilute it with 2 cups of water. You can also use lemon juice in place of yogurt
- Next, pull the reddish petals backward, as shown in the picture below.
- Between these Reddish petals, there will be bunches of yellow tipped florets which will become bananas soon if left on the tree. Pull out the bunch of florets.
- Each flower has to be prepared separately. It involves 2 steps.
- First, pull out the Match stick shaped pisil as shown in the picture below.
- Next, pull out the outermost petal which looks like a Scale.
- As and when the flowers are prepared, put them into the yogurt water. This is a very important step as every time we separate the parts of the flower, they get oxidized very and they will become dark in color. Putting them in yogurt water helps with the color and it helps in loosing the bitterness of the flower.
- As we repeat this process, the petals / Bracts will become pale white in color and after a point, we cannot pull out any more petals. This is called a bud.
- After that, cut the stem as shown in the picture below.
- Then, chop the bud into desired size pieces and put them in yogurt water. Do this step as quickly as possible. Decolorization for the bud takes place very quickly when compared to the flowers.
- Keep the flowers in Yogurt water till you cook them, else for 1-2 hours.
Eat Healthy! Live Happy!
Soumya
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