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Full of beans
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Every part of this bean is high on nutrition
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The Goa Bean, or the Winged Bean, is probably native to Papua New Guinea or Indonesia and is a common legume in the tropics. When fully ripe, the Goa bean pods turn brown and split open with a loud popping sound: in fact, the botanical name for the genus - Psophocarpus is Greek for `noisy fruit'.
The Goa bean's leaves, pods, flowers, green seeds, dry seeds and (in some varieties) tuberous roots are edible and nutritious. The flowers are edible and eaten raw, fried or steamed. Sautéed flowers taste like mushrooms, and the light blue flowers add colour to foods. The young shoots and leaves are edible raw or cooked as green vegetables; the tender stems and leaves improve the fibre and nutrition content of curries and soups, just like spinach. Roasting the plant's dried and peeled tubers is the best way to prepare these nutritious roots.
Young seed pods taste like French beans. Immature seeds are ideal for soups. Indonesians prepare tempeh and tofu from the fermented seeds, which are rich in protein. Milk and flour made from the seeds is an excellent food for malnourished children with protein deficiency. Mature seeds are edible, cooked. Roasted seeds are a coffee substitute.
A 100 gm of mature Goa bean seeds, cooked and boiled without salt, contains 147 calories. On the whole, the seeds are a good source of protein, the B Vitamin Thiamine, Vitamin E, Calcium, Iron and Phosphorus, Copper and Manganese.
The immature seeds contain one-fifth of the mature seeds' calories, and they are a good source of Thiamine, Riboflavin, Vitamin B6, Calcium, Iron and Magnesium. They are also rich in Vitamin C, Folate, Potassium and Manganese.
A 100 gm of the tuber contains 148 calories. The tubers are low in saturated fat and sodium, and contain very little cholesterol. They are a good source of protein. They contain 20 per cent or more protein, which is about 12 times that of potatoes. The tubers are also rich in Thiamine, Potassium, Manganese and Copper.
A 100 gm of the leaves contains 74 calories. Even the leaves are high in protein — being around 19 per cent of the leaf's calories. They are rich in Vitamin B6 and Zinc, and are a good source of Vitamin A, Vitamin C, Thiamine, Riboflavin, Niacin, Calcium, Iron, Copper and Manganese.
RAJIV. M
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