LYCHEE

Learn more about Lychee here. Their properties, nutritional values, medicinal uses are discussed here.

Botanical Name: Litchi chinensis

Family Name: Annonnceae

Description:

Lychee grows on an evergreen tree, 10-12 meter high, with broad round- topped crownof glossy green foliage. Leaves are pinnate with 2-9 leaflets. Flower is polygamous, small, greenish white or yellowish. Fruit is globose or oblong to ovate, 2.5 cm or more in diameter with a dark or light red or yellow rind, faintly or sharply tubercled and brittle; fleshy- white, translucent, juicy, covering fully a large, dark brown, elliptic seed.

Distribution:

This fruit is a native of China. It is now cultivated in a number of countries, outside china, including India, Burma, Thailand, Australia and New Zealand. India and South Africa are largest producers other than China.

Parts Used:

Fruit

Forms of Use:

Fruit, Jam, Jelly, Juice

Properties:

Refreshing

Nutritive

Tonic

Diuretic

Products- preservation:

Fruit arils can be preserved by canning it with syrup. In China, a solution of common salt is sprinkled over fruits to prevent rapid spoilage.

Juice can be obtained by routine method, by adding preservatives like potassium meta-bi-sulphite in sugar syrup.

NUTRITIONAL VALUE:

This fruit consists of peel, aril and seed. The aril, which can be readily separated from seed, is soft and juicy with a delicious flavor and is generally eaten fresh. It yields 38.7 - 58.7% of juice containing:

Total sugars (as invert sugar): 12.1 – 14.8 %

Reducing sugar: 9.0 – 13.7 %

Non- reducing sugar (sucrose, maltose): 1.0- 3.4%

Acid (as citric acid): 0.72- 0.36 %

Ascorbic acid: 34.5 – 45.4 mg per 100 gm

Analysis of fresh arils gave the following composition (per 100 gm):

Moisture: 84.5 %

Protein: 1.0 %

Fat: 0.3%

Carbohydrate: 13.6 %

Fiber: 0.4 %

Minerals: 0.5 %

Calcium: 10 mg

Phosphorus: 30 mg

Nicotinic acid: 0.4 mg

Ascorbic acid: 247 per 100 gm

Also contains vitamins B1 and B2.

MEDICINAL USES:

1. Fruit seeds are used in China for intestinal trouble.

2. Fruit seeds are also used against anodyne and prescribed in neuralgic disorders and orchitis.

3. Fruit is said to be diuretic and digestive.

4. Lychee fruits serve as very refreshing tonic.

FRUITS and VAGETABLES

CURATIVE JUICES

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