Kushmanda and its many benefits
One of our favourite summer vegetables is winter melon also know as ash gourd. Our Ayurvedic Lifestyle Consultant students learned about this vegetable and cooked with it this week. 🧑🍳 Have you cooked with winter melon before? Or have you drank the juice? In Ayurveda, winter melon is considered to be one of the most healing vegetables. In Sanskrit, it is called Kushmanda which can be translated as “the fruit and seeds do not contain heat”. Which makes it so perfect during the summer month. 🌞🌞🌞 This vegetable is available in Australia. Keep your eyes open in your local Asian grocery store. Winter melon is cultivated throughout Southeast Asia and grows well in Australia during the warm seasons. Winter melon 🍈 belongs to the gourd family. This group of vegetables provide vitamins, essential minerals, antioxidants and soluble fibres. Kushmanda has numerous benefits, especially those for balancing Vata and Pitta dosha. 1. Cooling effect on the body 🆒 2. It has anti-allergic properties and can be helpful in pitta-induced skin inflammation and allergies. 3. Treatment of the nervous system. 4. Peptic ulcers, burning sensation, acidity🔥 5. Urinary disease, cleanses the bladder 6. Heart disease❤️ 7. Gives relief to constipation and helps in bleeding piles 8. Beneficial in fever 🥵 9. Useful in asthma and cough 😷 10. Has a calming effect on the mind and is found to be beneficial in slowing Alzheimer’s disease 🚽🧘♀️ Traditional Ayurvedic uses and their Sanskrit terms: 🍈Weakness (Daurbalya) 🍈Painful urination (Mootrakrichchra) 🍈Kidney stones (Ashmari) 🍈Diabetes (Prameha) 🍈Bleeding disorder (Raktapitta) 🍈Fever (Jwara) 🍈Emaciation (Shosha) 🍈Thirst (Trishna) 🍈Giddiness (Bhrama) 🍈Vomiting (Chard) 🍈Cough and shortness of breath (Kasa/ Shwasa) 🍈Pitta disease 🍈Apasmara/ epilepsy 🍈Nourishes Tarpana Kapha WOW food is medicine!!! 🙏 If you would like to learn more about Ayurvedic Nutrition we recommend an initial consultation or you are welcome to join our ALC training course 🙏. With love Karin and the Lakshmi team 🪷