Carol Ojeda-Kimbrough shares with us with an article about Malunggay or Moringa.
Extending Malunggay Shelf
Life by Dehydrating/Drying
In the US, Filipinos have access to fresh malunggay leaves
from their backyards, Filipino/Asian groceries, or farmers markets. But in the winter, malunggay is not readily
available or if you can find it in at Seafood City, it is prohibitively
expensive. Often we have to wait until the following
spring or use substitutes such as spinach when cooking tinola or ginisang
munggo. Here is one way to extend the shelf life of
malunggay – by drying the leaves and storing them for future use. I do
this with the bounty of summer and in the winter months, I have a steady supply
of malunggay when I need them, especially to make hot Tinola soup.
YouTube shows various ways of drying malunggay/moringa
leaves but this is how I do it. In the
past, I used to hang the branches of malunggay in my back porch (away from
direct sunlight) and wait 3 days or more for the leaves to dry.
Place the dried leaves in an airtight container and keep in
a cool, dry place. In the winter, when
your malunggay plant has gone dormant or is not available at your Asian market,
you can grab a handful of the dried leaves and cook it the way you normally
would with fresh leaves. The liquid in
the cooking broth will rehydrate the leaves.
Malunggay/Moringa
Powder
The latest health craze on the market is Moringa, or malunggay
powder and if you go to Amazon.com, you’ll find many vendors selling this at a
high premium: $15-$20 for 16
oz.!!!! Why spend that when you can make
your own malunggay/moringa powder for a fraction of the cost.
You can process the dried leaves into powder - use a blender
or if you have a NutriBullet, use the milling blades and pulverize the leaves
into powder. Place the powder in an
airtight jar. A teaspoon of the powder is enough to make a big mug of tea.
If you are into healing bone broth, you can add
a teaspoon of malunggay powder into a steaming hot cup of bone broth. I just made a big batch of chicken broth,
which I divided into six-quart containers and put in the freezer for use as
needed. Put a quart of broth in a
saucepan, add sliced ginger, onions and garlic.
Let it come to a boil and season with patis (fish sauce) and black
pepper. Or if you’re in a hurry/lazy,
just add 2-3 teaspoons of Tinola mix (watch the sodium content). Add dried or powdered malunggay leaves and
you have instant Tinola broth. There’s
nothing like sipping hot Tinola broth with malunggay powder (or leaves) to ward
away stress and aches of the daily grind.
Malunggay Pasta
I’ve seen posts and instructions on using fresh malunggay leaves when making pasta. I decided to use malunggay powder because it gives a more uniform color and is easier to work with. It is a fairly easy process:
I’ve seen posts and instructions on using fresh malunggay leaves when making pasta. I decided to use malunggay powder because it gives a more uniform color and is easier to work with. It is a fairly easy process:
Ingredients
§ 3 cups flour
§ ¼ tsp salt
§ 3 tbsp malunggay powder
§ 4 eggs
§ 3 tbsp olive oil
Place flour, salt and malunggay powder in a mixing bowl and
mix together. Make a well at the center
of the bowl and add the eggs and oil.
Using a fork (I use two chopsticks, it seems to work better), mix all
the ingredients until it starts to come together. At this point you can use your (clean) hands
to knead the dough – at first it may be sticky but keep kneading and it will
soon be smooth and soft. You may need to
dust the dough with more flour (but don’t overdo it). After kneading for about 10-15 minutes,
flatten the dough into a disk and cover with plastic wrap. Let it rest for about 30 minutes.
After 30 minutes (or more), cut the dough disk into four
equal parts. Take one part (cover the
other three parts with the plastic wrap to keep it from drying out) and using a pasta maker, start rolling the dough
from the widest setting (#1 in most pasta makers). Fold the rolled dough and then roll it out
two more times in the same setting.
From this point, change the setting to the next number and roll the
dough once through each setting. You
will notice the dough will get thinner and longer. When you get to the desired thickness, you
can decide what you want to make and tailor your pasta accordingly: if you are making lasagna, ravioli, or want
to use the pasta for wonton or dumpling wrapper, you can just cut the length of
the dough to size; if making linguini or angel hair pasta/pancit, use the
appropriate pasta maker setting. You can dry the pasta and cook it later but I
like cooking fresh pasta as it does not take long to cook.
I haven’t tried making malunggay pan de sal or
malunggay dumplings, and I am excited to try making these. I’ll surely be posting the results in the
future. Hope you find this useful and if
you have any suggestions or other ways of using Malunggay/Moringa powder, I’d
love to hear from you.
BIO: Carol Ojeda-Kimbrough is a long-time community activist involved in political, social and environmental justice causes. After pursuing careers in the private and public sectors, Carol Ojeda-Kimbrough joined the Asian American Studies Program at CSU Fullerton as an Adjunct Professor. In 2016, Carol retired from teaching to spend precious time with her grandchildren and in "cultivating and nurturing" a more creative life. Carol is an avid gardener and enjoys finding ways of preserving the fruits of her labor. Contact info: asamprof@gmail.com
Tags: health, medicine, alternative medicine, food,
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