Malunggay - An Important Functional Food

The Philippine Technical Working Group identified moringa, also known as horse radish or malunggay in the Philippines, as one of the eight functional foods, along with coconut oil, coconut products, turmeric, seaweeds, root crops, local berries, pili, and edible mushrooms.

These functional foods were chosen because they contain one or more nutrients which are helpful in improving and supporting one's health and "may prevent risks for some certain disorders."

Source: Food and Nutrition Research Institute, DOST

What are these "certain disorders?" In this article published by the FNRI Digest on the first quarter of 2018, they pointed out that about 31% of Filipino adults suffer from obesity, 22% have high blood pressure, and about 6% have elevated blood sugar levels. In addition, 2 out of 10 Filipino adults also have high cholesterol levels. 

Consuming adequate amounts of functional foods like moringa and making them part of our regular diet is an effective strategy to maximize health and reduce disease risk. However, "functional foods" are not magic foods. The best way to live a healthy life is still through proper diet and maintaining a healthy body weight along with regular exercise, avoiding tobacco, and reducing stress.

Moringa For Diet and Weight Loss

If you're looking for ways to  lose weight, taking moringa supplements might be beneficial for you.

Moringa has high levels of B vitamins, which are great metabolism boosters. B vitamins can help support and promote a more efficient metabolism. An efficient metabolism burns more calories, which can help if you want to lose weight. Moringa may help get rid of fats and waste faster because it stimulates metabolism and helps the body digest food quicker.

In addition, because moringa is rich in nutrients, it can provide our body with essential vitamins like Vitamin A and C, calcium, and protein, which can give our body more energy and curb our cravings for junk food.

Moringa is also high in fiber. Fresh moringa leaves and moringa supplements in the form of powder, capsules, or tea offer varying amounts of fiber. Adding lots of fiber like moringa into your diet is another natural solution to cravings, which could help you meet your weight loss needs.

Eating lots of leafy vegetables is necessary to improve and maintain one's weight and diet. Leaves such as spinach and moringa can make you feel full longer, while also keeping your calorie intake low. It is therefore easier to maintain a healthy diet without experiencing cravings for high-calorie foods.

Moringa supplements like powder, tea, or capsules are in concentrated form and will provide the body the same amount of vitamins and nutrients present in fresh leafy greens. If you're not into eating veggies, taking supplements everyday is a quick and easy way to gain all the nutrients your body needs.

The Nutritious Moringa - Benefits of Taking Moringa

Moringa contains high levels of vitamins, minerals, and amino acids. What's great about moringa is that unlike multivitamins that are mechanically processed in laboratories, moringa is an all natural source of vitamins, minerals, protein, antioxidants, and other important substances that our body needs to stay healthy.  It is a powerhouse of nutrients, which is why nutritionists around the world consider moringa a superfood!

Moringa has Vitamin A (beta carotene), Vitamin B1 (Thiamine), Vitamin B2 (Riboflavin), Vitamin B3 (Niacin), Vitamin B6 (Pyridoxine), Vitamin B7 (Biotin), Vitamin C (Ascorbic Acid), Vitamin D (Cholecalciferol), Vitamin E (Tocopherol) and Vitamin K.

Moringa also contains significant amounts of chromium, copper, iron, magnesium, manganese, phosphorous and zinc. In addition, moringa has 9 out of 10 essential amino acids, which our body needs to grow, repair, and maintain cells.

Uses of (Moringa) Malunggay Powder

MalunggayLife's Moringa Leaf Powder can be used in a variety of ways:

• Add moringa powder to any dishes, rice, soups and stews for a more nutritious meal.
• Sprinkle it on your salad. 
• Mix it with your favorite hot drinks like coffee, milk, or chocolate to give you that extra energy boost.
• Blend it with your fruit smoothies, juices, or shakes.
• Use it in baking bread, cookies, and other sweets and pastries.
• Make a warm cup of tea.

Nutrition Week Celebration

The month of July is Nutrition Month in the Philippines, and Nutrition Week was celebrated today, July 10, in Princess Urduja, Narra. This year's Nutrition Month theme is "Ugaliing Magtanim, Sapat na Nutrisyon Aanihin."

Various organizations, schools, and every barangay's zone participated in the event, and there were guest nutritionists explaining about the importance of eating nutritious food. 

Our products on display

Malunggay Life was one of the booths that participated.

 

   
    

Malunggay Life Moringa Farm Updates

Our moringa trees have started growing more leaves! We have harvested almost all of the mature fruit from our malunggay trees, probably only about 10% still have fruits.

We harvest the leaves every week, and dry and process them on the same week so that our Moringa powder and capsules are always fresh.  

We also continue to plant more moringa seedlings so we can reach our goal of 10,000 new moringa trees by end of this year. At the moment, we have about 7,000~8,000 trees in the farm.

Our workers harvesting some leaves to be processed into moringa powder

We have covered the soil with plastic mulching so we can control weed growth.

Green, fresh, and healthy leaves~

We are constantly germinating, nursing, and planting more seedlings so we can reach our goal of 10,000 new trees by the end of this year.

Moringa Oil (Malunggay Oil) Benefits

Moringa Oil is extracted from the seeds of the Malunggay tree (moringa oleifera). The oil extracted from Moringa oleifera is also called Ben Oil because it has high amounts of behenic acid. Other species of Moringa can also produce Moringa oil, but they are not called Ben oil. This name is especially reserved for Moringa oleifera oil.

Benefits of Moringa Oil

• Has anti-aging properties
• Helps moisturize, brighten, and rejuvenate skin
• Has antiseptic and anti-inflammatory properties 
• Acts as a natural combatant against skin troubles and face blemishes
• Helps fight acne, black heads, and dark spots
• Helps strengthen hair
• Moisturizes dry scalp
• Helps reduce split ends and dandruff

Ongoing Construction of Vermicomposting Bed

We've started construction of our vermicomposting bed in the farm. This is actually a long overdue project, as we have been very busy taking care of MalunggayLife Agri Farm's business permits. We want our moringa farm to stay true to our principle of natural, organic farming, so instead of always buying animal manure from our sources, we have decided to make our own from worms.

Vermicomposting is a composting process that makes use of various species of worms. The end product, called vermicast, is rich in nutrients and loaded with microorganisms that are beneficial in creating and maintaining healthy soil.

Honestly, I am terrified of worms, and I don't know if I would ever be able to touch any of these worms with my bare hands. We'll see in the coming weeks.^^

Meanwhile, the rainy season has started, so our trees are beginning to grow more leaves again. We have stopped gathering leaves during the past months so we can gather all the seeds we will be using for this planting season. We've cut the trees back to a height of about a meter to encourage leaf growth once again.

Unfortunately, cogon also grows extremely well during the rainy season. Since we don't use herbicides, our farm workers have to manually pull out the grass. 

Fresh harvest: Moringa Seeds and Leaves

It's been a while since I posted my last update about our moringa (malunggay) farm.

We haven't been harvesting leaves because we wanted to find out how long it takes before a tree produces moringa pods, and also be able to produce our own moringa seeds that we can plant in our farm.

Planting seeds that came from our own farm means we are 100% sure the seeds are also organic since we only use organic and natural fertilizers, herbicides, and pesticides in our farm.

   

Moringa flowers started blooming in the farm early January

The trees started bearing moringa pods early February.

Moringa pods, freshly harvested from the farm and ready for planting!

Healthy moringa seeds

This will supply us with more than enough seeds we need to plant more moringa trees!

We couldn't harvest leaves from those trees that bear fruit, but we were able to get some moringa leaves from those trees that don't have moringa pods.