Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Peria/FooGua/KhorGuay

Bitter Gourd
aka Bitter Melon

Its scientific name is Momordica charantia (Wikipedia)


Our first harvest of one of our favourite vegetable, the Bitter Gourd [the chinese variety]

(also known in Hokkien as Khor Guay) was from our very own garden and grown 100% organically. It is very special to us for all of our hard work.

Wifey made some natural organic enzymes out of fruits & vegetables as an organic fertilizer and it works!

Again for the first time, we let it ripen till it turns yellow. It is slightly softer than the ordinary ones bought from the wet market. It is rare to obtain such ripe gourds at the market because all of them are harvested green . Buying them yellow would meant that they are about to be rotting!

Ours were deliberately left to ripen before harvest.
That is the difference.

Ours are purely organic too. No pesticides, no toxic fungicides, no chemical fertilizer and fresh.

Just look at the deep red seed pith!


Contrary to what was written, the yellow gourd is sweeter and less bitter than the green ones. It has a fruity taste and contains a strong yellow Phyto-nutrient similar to the colorful capsicums.
We made a Chinese (Hokkien) soup dish called "Khor Guay Bark Kin Th'ng" that uses thin slices of seasoned lean pork, chopped garlic and the bitter gourd.

Delicious!!! No added salt to remove its bitterness and less cooking time to enjoy all its nutrients.

This is one vegetable to watch and is being studied closely by scientists in China and Australia for its properties to help those who has elevated blood/sugar levels, HIV and Malaria.

It have also been noted for its cleansing properties such as detoxification of our liver.

2 comments:

*+* Carmen *+* said...

the foo gua looked so healthy, how to plant leh? perhaps reserved some seats for me to plant?

Birds Talking Too said...

Thanks Carmen for comment.

Yah got seeds if anyone wans.
Already sprouting on 2nd. batch. It is so easy to grow but also depends where. Needs some shade though.

Cheers and Regards