HOW TO GROW TURMERIC
longa plant and is a very unique spice
as you will see turmeric is one of my
favorite plants to grow not only because
it's so easy to grow them the
nutritional profile of turmeric is just
excellent it's a superfood and it has
medicinal qualities that you might not
have even heard of I will soon see that
in the later sections of the video and I
just want to mention that I'm not making
any claims of how good tumeric is but
there have been a lot of studies
conducted on turmeric that show that it
has a lot of medicinal properties so how
do you start turmeric what you see here
is a small portion of turmeric that's
easily available in a lot of Asian
grocery stores and what you do is just
blend them in a small pot to start and
turmeric usually grows in the summer
season so you might see the plant
sprouting out somewhere around June in
the state of California and then they go
on to grow till winter sets in so once
you've planted turmeric you can move
them to a bigger pot and as soon as you
move them to a bigger pot or bigger
container they will start growing tubers
or around the container and as you can
see here we have one plant growing and
it has already started sending out a lot
of small offshoots or tubers around it
and that's what is going to give you a
lot of turmeric now growing turmeric is
just so easy all you do is provided some
good soil you do not need any
fertilizers to grow turmeric it's very
fast growing very prolific plant and as
long as you have decent temperatures you
shouldn't have a problem growing too
turmeric plant
now this turmeric plant is ready for
harvest
it usually takes about
for months or so to harvest tumeric
now I know a lot of you might not be
really familiar with what tumeric is so
while we are harvesting this tumeric
plant let's talk a little bit about
tumeric tumeric has a peppery warm and
bitter flavor so flavor wise you could
think of it as a cross between orange
and ginger that's how it tastes like
it's one of the necessary ingredients
used to make curry various types of
curries now let's talk a little bit
about the medicinal properties of
tumeric because that's what fascinates
me the most now there have been a lot of
studies conducted so I'm just citing you
what the studies have confirmed I'm not
making any claims I'm not tied to the
tumeric industry in any regard now what
makes tumeric very unique is that it
contains a compound which is called
curcumin now curcumin is the main active
ingredient in tumeric it is a powerful
anti-inflammatory ingredient it has
antioxidant effects now I'm not going to
talk a lot about antioxidants because
it's a totally separate topic for
discussion and the anti-inflammatory
properties of turmeric means that it's
very similar to drugs like motrin that
cause relief from muscular pain and act
as anti-inflammatory ingredient when you
consume them but the best thing about
turmeric and curcumin is that although
it's toxic to a lot of bacteria and
viruses it's not toxic to human beings
at all and that's what really makes
tumeric a very unique food that exists
in the world today so there have been
studies conducted which have proven that
turmeric in combination with some foods
is actually very effective in curing
some diseases so for example tumeric and
onions may help prevent colon cancers
tumeric with cauliflower may help
prevent prostrate cancer
tumeric is known to reduce the risk of
childhood leukemia
it improves liver function it improves
cardiovascular function and it is also
known to provide protection against
Alzheimer's disease and remember that
although a lot of claims have been made
against what turmeric does and what
curcumin which is an ingredient in
turmeric does try it out for yourself
next time you have a sore throat instead
of reaching out for an over-the-counter
medicine just take some warm milk and
add a couple of spoons of turmeric
powder in it and drink it slowly just
before you sleep and see if it makes a
difference the next day when you wake up
I'm sure you're going to feel a lot
relieved after having the turmeric and
warm milk the night prior the Indians
and the Chinese have been using turmeric
for a long time as a medicine for a lot
of home remedies for example for cuts
and burns they just used to mix tumeric
and water and create a paste and then
apply it on the cuts or the burns and
that would cure the cuts and the burns
very effectively so now that you know
all the good part about turmeric how do
you use it the most popular way of using
turmeric is as a dry spice the dried
turmeric powder is availab available in
a lot of grocery stores if you grow your
own turmeric you can also make your own
turmeric powder at home you can add it
to omelets to give it a deep yellow
color you can use it in curry powder
when preparing vegetables like
cauliflower green beans onions peppers
broccoli watch for the recipe at the end
of the video turmeric is also a great
spice to compliment any recipe that
features lentils
and the recipe that I will be sharing
with you at the end of the video is a
cauliflower peas recipe which can be
made with tumeric it tastes delicious
and it's really good for your health
so harvest is now completed it's very
easy to harvest the turmeric as you saw
here and this is how it looks like once
the turmeric has been harvested you
still need to clean them remove all the
roots that are attached to these tubers
and then you're all set
so our tumeric now is washed and all
ready to be used now the best way to
enjoy fresh tumeric is to add them in
smoothies you can just toss them in with
your fruit smoothies it might take some
time for you to get used to the tumeric
taste but it's really good for your
health now what is also interesting is
what you can do with tumeric leaves
turmeric leaves have a very unique
flavor so what you do with the leaves is
that you can roll up the leaves just
like that put your filling right there
roll it up and you can just steam your
filling and the tumeric leaf is going to
impart it a nice flavor so do try it out
