Whenever we leave the farm, I always carry our trusty Duckie Bag with us. It has a silver Mallard Symbol and has an upside down (?) duckie pattern.
Duckie Bag!
This is our travel food bag and I never leave home without it. We never like to “feel caught out” in town (or on the highway traveling) having to procure water or a hot drink. On a minimal shopping day out in Punta Gorda, I will bring two litres of water, 1 litre flask of hot water, coffee and tea. Oh, and of course, a packet of Digestive biscuits! So, whenever we feel like a break, we will pull over in the truck and make a nice hot drink together and dip our biscuits in the hot beverage. Awwwhhh…so romantic!! I have even bought special drinking cups for the occasion! His and Hers; Munchkin and Gnome Paraphernalia.
Travel Cups For Munchkin and Gnome.
Right now, we have been bringing our special Teh Tarik tea from Singapore to have “on-the-go.”
Teh Tarik.
It’s all in the name having fun, doing something different and saving money. What a Triple Combo!!
Provision bark, Pachira aquatica is a tree that grows along rivers and streams in Belize and Central America. The making and drinking of provision bark tea has an interesting history that goes back to the days of rubber and chicle tapping and mahogany logging when this tea was made as a food substitute for workers due to food shortages. The traditional uses for this tea include treatment of anaemia, exhaustion and low blood pressure.
We decided to try some of this tea because we have planted some of these trees at our pond area. We have the wild type, Pachira aquatica, which produces large brown seed pods about 30cm (12 inches) in diameter. These seeds are edible, but very mealy (of course, we’ve tried them) and have the taste and texture of cardboard soaked in tannin; we would classify them as survival food only. We also have the cultivated variety of this tree, Pachira glabra which is the type that is grown in East Asia for the edible seeds. This variety has a smaller green pod which is about 15cm (6 inches) in diameter. These seeds are sweet and delectable and taste similar to chestnuts.
Provision Bark Tea.
To make a tea, I took a piece of provision bark about 10cm (4 inches) by 30cm (12 inches) and boiled it in a 8 litres (2 gallons) of water for 30 minutes. The resulting beverage was a beautiful amber colour and it tasted pleasant and slightly sweet. There was no particularly strong tannic or bitter components. Overall, it felt “cooling” in a Traditional Chinese Medicine sense and we thought that it had mildly diuretic properties. We left the piece of bark in the water for five days and drank 3 to 5 glasses each, a day. We reboiled the tea at the end of the day to keep it sterilised and topped it up with water when necessary.
Other than consuming this tea for the traditional uses, I would recommend enjoying this tea as an iced beverage with a slice of lemon or lime. Furthermore, because of its wonderful colour, Gnome is thinking of making a beer with this bark as an ingredient. In other words, there is a lot of room for experimentation with provision bark tea.
The Mayan Passion Fruit (Ketchi name is Kun Batz) is still in season. It is a vine which voluntarily grows around cultivated trees and it can also exist in the rainforest of Belize.
Kun Batz Green Fruit.
They have beautiful flowers so can they also be grown as an ornamental:
Kun Batz Flowers.
The fruit can be eaten green like a vegetable (like cho-cho or zucchini).
Green Kun Batz Steamed.Kun Batz in Miso Soup.
If you let it ripen, you can eat the fruit pulp like a passion fruit.
Ripe Kun Batz.
The seeds and the pulp are edible and can be eaten alone or mixed with yoghurt or ice-cream. Today, I sifted out the seeds to get the pulp and the juice:
Kun Batz Seeds and Pulp.
I used a total of eight fruit and towards the end, added a cup of water to the remaining seeds to try to extract the last of the pulp. I was able to make a quart of juice from this method. When I tasted it I felt that it was sweet enough that no sugar was required. Compare this with normal passion fruit which is quite acidic which requires sweetening in order to enhance the taste. This is Kun Batz juice with a sprig of mint:
Kun Batz Juice.
The Kun Batz juice is divine!! The taste of the juice is a combination of pineapple, banana and canteloupe melon with mild exotic hints of passion fruit. It is unique in that it has a mildly sour taste but it is sweet enough that no sugar is needed.
I have a whole lot of fresh seeds to sell so check out The Apothecary. To my knowledge, nobody is cultivating this bush fruit so if you are into rare and exotic plants, then this a definitely one to add to the list!
Planting Instructions:
Passiflora seeds have a hard shell so pr-treat the seeds before planting; Soak the seeds for 24-48 hours in warm to the touch water, just prior to planting. Once pretreated, plant seeds 1/2-1″ deep in moist, sterile soil. Keep soil temperature consistent at about 70-85F. Cool soils will significantly delay seed germination time.
Estimated germination time under optimal conditions: 6 weeks to 6 months.
Plant spacing for this vine is 10 feet (3 metres) apart and can grow to about 20 feet tall. Will start fruiting in about 12 months.
