PICK a handful of firm, dark green cucumber and pop them into your shopping basket. Congratulations! You have just bought yourself a fruit (yes, the cool cuke is fruit, not a vegetable) full of good health!
Here is a short list of the impressive health benefits that a cucumber carries:
Keeps you hydrated. If you are too busy to drink enough water, munch on the cool cucumber, which is 96 percent water. It will cheerfully compensate!
Fights heat, both inside and out. Eat cucumber, and your body gets relief from heartburn. Apply cucumber on your skin, and you get relief from sunburn.
Flushes out toxins. All that water in cucumber acts as a virtual broom, sweeping waste products out of your system. With regular use, cucumber is known to dissolve kidney stones.
Lavishes you with vitamins. A B and C, which boost immunity, give you energy, and keep you radiant. Give it more power by juicing cucumber with carrot and spinach.
Supplies skin-friendly minerals: magnesium, potassium, silicon. That’s why cucumber-based treatments abound in spas.
Aids in weight loss. Enjoy cucumbers in your salads and soups. My favorite snack? Crunchy cucumber sticks with creamy low-fat yogurt dip.
Revives the eyes. Placing chilled slices of cucumber on the eyes is a clichéd beauty visual, but it really helps reduce under-eye bags and puffiness.
Cuts cancer. Cut down your risk of several cancers by including cucumber in your diet. Several studies show its cancer-fighting potential.
Stabilizes blood pressure. Patients of blood pressure, both high and low, often find that eating cucumber brings relief.
Refreshes the mouth. Cucumber juice refreshes and heals diseased gums, leaving your mouth smelling good.
Helps digestion. Chewing cucumber gives the jaws a good workout, and the fiber in it is great for digestion.
Smooths hair and nails. Silica, the wonder mineral in cucumber makes your hair and nails stronger and shiner.
Soothes muscle and joint pain. All those vitamins and minerals in cucumber make it a powerful enemy of muscle and joint pain.
Keeps kidneys in shape. Cucumber lowers uric acid levels in your system, keeping the kidneys happy.
Good for diabetics. Patients of diabetes can enjoy cucumber while also reaping its health benefits: cucumber contains a hormone needed by the cells of the pancreas for producing insulin.
Reduces cholesterol. A compound called sterols in cucumber helps reduce bad cholesterol.
Cucumber Nutrition Facts
Ever wonder how to beat the scorching summer heat? Just remember your backyard, humble crunchy cucumber! Nonetheless, this wonderful low calorie vegetable indeed has more nutrients to offer than just water and electrolytes.
It is one of the oldest cultivated crops, and believed to be originating in the northern sub-Himalayan plains of India. The plant is a creeper (vine) akin to other members of Cucurbita family such as gourds, squashes, melons, zucchini, etc.
Botanically; it belongs to the Cucurbitaceae family; and is known scientifically as Cucumis sativus.
Cucumber is easy to grow. Varieties, varying in size, shape, and color, are cultivated all around the world, under different climatic zones. In general, the fruit features dark-green skin, crispy, moisture rich flesh, and small edible seeds concentrated at its core.
As in other squash members, cucumbers too are best-harvested young, tender and just short of reaching maturity; at the stage when they taste sweet, have crunchy texture, and unique flavor. If left uninterrupted, the fruit continues to grow in size, its skin becomes tougher and turns yellow, and seeds become hard and inedible. Fresh cucumbers are available throughout the season and can be eaten raw, in vegetable salads or juicing.
armenian cucumbers
Cucumis melo var. flexuosus-Armenian type.Dosakayi-Indian curry cucumber. Salad (slicing) cucumber by side for comparison.
Armenian cucumbers (Cucumis melo var. flexuosus) are long, crispy, thin-ribbed, curvy, and possess light green color. Although grouped botanically in the melon family, they appear and taste just like in cucumbers.
Miniature varieties such as gherkins, American-dills, and French-cornichons are very small in size and usually preferred in pickling.
Dosakayi is a yellow Indian curry cucumber. It has sweet taste and neutral flavor. It is used extensively in the preparation of stews and curries, particularly during the summer season in southern parts of India and Sri Lanka.
Health Benefits Of Cucumber
It is one of the very low calorie vegetables; provide just 15 calories per 100 g. It contains no saturated fats or cholesterol. Cucumber peel is a good source of dietary fiber that helps reduce constipation, and offer some protection against colon cancers by eliminating toxic compounds from the gut.
It is a very good source of potassium, an important intracellular electrolyte. 100 g of cucumber provides 147 mg of potassium but only 2 mg of sodium. Potassium is a heart friendly electrolyte helps bring a reduction in total blood pressure and heart rates by countering effects of sodium.
Cucumbers contains unique anti-oxidants in moderate ratios such as ß-carotene and a-carotene, vitamin-C, vitamin-A, zea-xanthin and lutein. These compounds help act as protective scavengers against oxygen-derived free radicals and reactive oxygen species (ROS) that play a role in aging and various disease processes. Their total antioxidant strength, measured in terms of oxygen radical absorbance capacity (ORAC value), is 214 µmol TE/100 g.
Cucumbers have mild diuretic property, which perhaps attributed to their free-water, and potassium and low sodium content. This helps in checking weight gain and high blood pressure.
They surprisingly have a high amount of vitamin K, provides about 17 µg of this vitamin per 100 g. Vitamin-K has been found to have a potential role in bone strength by promoting osteotrophic (bone mass building) activity. It also has established role in the treatment of Alzheimer’s disease patients by limiting neuronal damage in their brain.
Cucumbers are readily sold in the local markets all around the season. Fresh varieties, depending upon the cultivar type and region, as well as preserved, pre-processed, and pickled are also made available in the grocery stores.
In the store, buy fresh ones that feature bright green color, firm and stout in texture. Look for spots, cuts or breaks over its surface. Do not buy overly mature or yellow colored cucumber since they tend to possess tough skin, and mature inedible seeds. Furthermore, avoid those with wrinkled ends as they indicate of old stock and out of flavor. Go for organically grown products to get rich flavor and nutrient content.
Once at home, they should be washed thoroughly in clean water to rid off any surface dirt and pesticide residues. Their skin comes in variety of colors and often with tiny spikes that should be rubbed off easily. Do not discard the peel as it has vital minerals, phyto-chemicals, and fiber.
To store, keep them at room temperature for a day or two, but better stored inside the refrigerator set at high relative humidity where they stay fresh for several days.
Preparation and serving methods
Wash them thoroughly in cold running water just before use. Sometimes, they may require light scrub at places where prickles or dirt attached firmly. Trim both ends using sharp knife and rub the ends to remove sticky, off-white, fluid like oozing substance in order to lessen bitter taste at either ends. Cut into cubes, slices, etc., as you may desire.