Bitter Gourd F1 Santur - Vegetable Seeds

Medicinal Use:

• Bitter gourd lowers blood glucose levels: Bitter gourd treatments of cell cultures or feeding trials with laboratory animals such as mice or rats show bitter gourd does have blood glucose lowering properties
• Bitter gourd is not like most medicinal drugs, which are effective only in one target organ or tissue; rather, it influences glucose metabolism all over the body
• Bitter gourd lowers dietary carbohydrate digestion: The glucose metabolism starts in the gut
• Carbohydrates and sugars are metabolised to glucose (one type of sugar) before glucose is transported from the gut to the blood
• Bitter gourd reduces the amount of glucose that is released into the blood by inhibiting the enzymes that break down disaccharides to two monosaccharides
• This effect is important for the treatment of both Type I and Type II diabetic patients and helps to prevent high blood sugar levels after meals
• Bitter gourd plant insulin discovered: The pancreas reacts to increasing blood sugar levels by secreting insulin into the blood
• Insulin helps to transport the sugar from the blood to the skeletal muscle and the fat tissue where it is used to produce energy
• Insulin will also stop the liver to produce sugar from glycogen storages and to release the sugar into the blood
• Thus, insulin is necessary to lower high blood sugar levels
• Bitter gourd reverses insulin resistance: Bitter gourd can play a role in the prevention and treatment of Type II diabetes, which is also called insulin-independent diabetes or adult onset diabetes
• This form of the disease usually occurs in people who are overweight and inactive
• People with insulin resistance or those with a high risk of developing Type II diabetes have a good chance to prevent and treat the disease without drugs by increasing their physical activity and changing their diet
• Bitter gourd prevents diabetic complications: Chronically high sugar concentrations from Type I and Type II diabetes increase the risk of inflammation and oxidation in the whole body, leading to blindness, diabetic feet, kidney disease, stroke, or heart attack
• Consuming bitter gourd can help prevent these complications, as it not only decreases blood sugar levels, but also has some antioxidative properties
• Bitter gourd can protect the body from other non-communicable diseases: Being overweight is one of the most important risk factors for diabetes and other diseases, and Type II diabetes is often accompanied by hypertension, high plasma cholesterol, or high plasma lipids
• Together, these conditions increase the risk of stroke or heart attack
• Apart from this, bitter gourd helps weight loss
• There is also evidence that bitter gourd might be effective in cancer treatment

Culinary Use:

• To prepare bitter melon, slice the fruit open and remove seeds and pith, do not peel
• Beginners to bitter melon may parboil the fruit to lessen bitterness, although aficionados say this changes the texture too much
• Typically bitter melon is stuffed, pickled, or curried and served with meat or in soup
• The fruit pairs well with other strong flavours, like garlic, Chinese black beans, chilli peppers, or coconut milk
• Frequently, bitter melon is stuffed with pork or shrimp and steamed
• Bitter melon enables glucose uptake and is used in traditional Chinese medicine to treat Type 2 diabetes
• If you suffer from hypoglycaemia, use caution consuming bitter melon
• The combination of the melon plus the drugs typically used to treat hypoglycaemia can decrease blood sugar levels to dangerously low levels