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| After about 5 months of growth, we harvested our tallest Moringa trees (I forgot a "before picture"- they were 5-6 ft tall), cutting them to about 9 inches from the ground. They will re-grow for subsequent harvests. You can see there are shorter ones that have a way to go before being harvested. |
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| We trimmed off the small branches and laid them out to dry in the hot equatorial sun. |
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| After drying we stripped off the leaves. |
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| We ground the leaves in a coffee grinder. |
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| From nine trees we harvested a nice amount of Moringa powder to be added to any food as a dietary supplement. See the link in the first caption for the benefits of Moringa. It is a tree that grows very well in this dry area and every part of the tree qualifies as a super food to the extreme. Though there are a few places in Kenya that are growing this for export because the health foodies of the west are on to its value, we'd like to see it become familiar here in our corner of Kenya and cultivated for the valuable crop that it is as well as for local use. |
aaahh- sooooo awesome!!!! vive le moringa and loving gardeners like you! what fruits of your relentless watering and the hand of God! did you start them from seeds or from branches? were they old enough to make fruit? something I've thought about is to start the tradition of giving moringa shoots as a gift to a expectant mothers to plant during pregnancy, and by the time the baby is ready for solid foods, they should be ready to harvest for nutritional supplement.
ReplyDeleteSo cool, sis...does moringa agree with your FM stomach?-ME
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