wonder watermelon

Back to foodstuffs tonight. Don't you just wanna sink your teeth into this juciy thing?! Especially on a hot day like today!

This pink or sometimes yellow fleshed fruit is simply marvelous. It, not only, gives us the sweet juicy thirst-quencher of a fruit, but it also has many great uses.

The fruit is fully consumed in my family, not even the peel with its whitish juicy parts nor the seeds are wasted.

My mum make delicious 'leong sui' (cooling soup) by cutting out the whitish juicy parts and boiling them with wintermelon sugar. Sometimes with the green peel/skin too. Try it - it's really yummy. My old and wise neighbourhood aunty poh-poh (grandma) would dry the skin together with it's whitish flesh and pulverised them into powder that is great for relief of sore throats and mouth ulcers.

Other uses?

*To counteract summer heat, reduces fever in the body and promotes urination:
 - eat the fruit!

*Clear lungs, lubricate intestines, quench thirts and aid digestion:
- eat the seeds! Chew them instead of spitting them all over.

*Treat diarrhea, dysentery, hypertension, toothaches:
- boil the roots and leaves for soup!

*Cure edema in the heart and kidney diseases:
- boil 60gm of fresh watermelon peel, or 30g of dried peel, in water and drink like tea!

*Quench thirst, and to cure cloudy urine in diabetics:
- boil 30gm of watermelon peel and wax gourd peel. Take as tea.

*Why is it so effective in combating heaty issues?
- watermelon induce heat in the pericardium (the membranous sac that covers the heart and the roots of major blood vessels) to travel to the stomach and small intestine, then to the bladder where the heat is excreted/expelled!

Oh, we forgot the seeds. Removed hygienically from the flesh with knife and spoon, rinse and dry, then toast it! It is kuachi! Without the chemical additives nor salt! Personally, I just like to chew on them with the flesh... a bit of crunch and a little nutty in flavour - yum!


* source: The Art of Long Life - Chinese Foods for Longevity by Henry C. Lu.

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