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TAP A SUGAR PALM ...
When a sugar palm is mature in 6 to 10 years, it begins to develop its first flower bunches, tapping for the sweet sap can begin. The sap is produced when the tree converts its starch reserves into sugar for the growth of the flower bunches. What is tapped is not the trunk of the tree but the stems of the tree's flower bunches. To obtain the sap, stems of the flower bunches are knocked regularly with wooden mallet and swayed around in different direction until the palm flower blossoms. Then the stem of the flowering bunches is cut off and the sugar-rich sap flowing from the stem is collected into containers hung on the stalk. In order to keep the sap flowing a thin next part of the stem is regularly sliced off. |
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Sugar palm can be tapped on a daily basis, twice a day. Collecting the fresh sap has been traditionally done by local farmers climbing high up to the trees using bamboo ladders that are attached to the trunks of the trees. It is a difficult and labor-intensive work. The tapping can actually extend the life of the tree.
The sap is known as "nira" when it is fresh, or "toddy" after fermentation. The traditional practices of adding bark to the sap helps to preseve the sap. Fresh sap is lightly clouded with mild sweet taste, a delicious drink by itself. The sap can be used to make sugar, ferment into vinegar, make alcohol like rum, or produce ethanol for fuel. The sap ferments immediately and it is essential to preserve the sap freshness in order to make good quality palm sugar. After two days upon collection, the alcohol content of the sap can reach up to 8%.
Traditionally, the sap is boiled over open fires in huge metal pans, stirred and cooked down to a caramel-like paste before pouring into coconut shell or bamboo molds to cool and harden into palm sugar cakes, cylinders, or blocks. As it is not highly processed, the taste, color, and the sweetness of the palm sugar can vary from batch to batch. |
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A sugar with deliciously caramel flavour with earthy and nutty sweet notes.
The flavor and color of the sugar depends much on the type of palm sap, terroir, cooking method, and temperature to reduce the sap to sugar.
The color can be as light as creamy beige or as dark as caramel brown, and consistency is soft and gooey, to rock hard, depending on how long the sap is reduced. The darker color one has more fragrant smoky aroma.
Palm sugar is less sweet than cane sugar.
Palm sugar smells wonderful. We had a jar of palm sugar left opened in the kitchen and the scent of the sugar slowly infuse the entire kitchen with fragrance that is mellow and subtlety sweet. Home sweet home.
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 ... There are different types of palm sugar – the light yellow, pale brown from Vietnam and Thailand, and the darker, smoky version in Malaysia and Indonesia. Each has a unique sweetness and fragrant. Indonesian palm sugar is smokier and caramelly in taste than Thai palm sugar. Overall, palm sugar is not intensely sweet.
Some commercial palm sugar is made with cane sugar. Too light a color can be an indication that white sugar is added in the palm sugar. Make sure you read the food label - ingredients and nutrition information. |
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 ... Nutritionally palm sugar is a very good source for a number of key minerals, vitamins, including potassium, magnesium, vitamins C, and amino acids such as arginine that boost the immune system. A low glycemic index (GI) rating under 30 makes palm sugar one of the lowest GI natural sweeteners available. Palm sugar contains protein, calcium and iron in beneficial quantities which are not present in refined sugars.
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Traditional palm sugar cake can be grated, cut with a knife, or use a pestle to break it into smaller pieces. |
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 ... Good quality palm sugar does not need refrigeration, keeps well when stored in cool dry place. |
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Sugar palm is commonly used as a term for species of palm trees that can harvest sugar. The real sugar palm (offical English name) is Arenga Pinnata.
- aren palm (arenga pinnata)
- coconut palm (cocos nucifera)
- date palm (phoenix sylvestris)
- kitual palm or Indian sago palm (caryota urens)
- palmyra palm (borassus flabellifer)
Palm sugar was traditionally made from the sap of the sugar palmyra palm. Today palm sugar has become a common term for cooked sap of coconut, date, arenga trees.
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 ... names in different regions
- gula aren, gula jawa, gula merah in Indonesia
- gula melaka in Malaysia
- gur in Northern India
- panai vellam, karruppu kati in South Indian State Tamilnadu
- jaggery in Sri Lanka and Burma
Coconut sugar is made from sap of sago, coconut palm.
Gula aren is made from sap of arenga pinnata palm.
Gula jawa, gula merah, panai vellam, karruppu kati are made from sap of palmyra palm.
There is a difference in taste between the coconut sugar and palm sugar.
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More about Palm Sugar and Sugar Palm...
- Palm Sugar has been traditionally used as a health sugar in India, China. It was imported in 1409 from Indonesia for the Chinese Emperor to use as diabetes sugar.
- Sugar palm trees grow in forests with a wide diversity of trees and plants.
- Sugar palm can be tapped daily ensuring continuous production and incomes for the farmers versus the seasonal harvesting of sugar cane.
- Dr. Willie Smits researches showed that there is no other tree that can produce alternative fuel as well as sugar palms. Sugar palms can also help the environment. Because of their deep root system, they can grow on steepest slopes and are effective in preventing landslides. They do not need to take over agriculture land and provide water sheds. They can survive in drought and still producing sap. The trees require no pesticide, fertilizer, and little water.
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- Sugar palm is a magic tree, from the roots to the leaves, every part is beneficial for people. Sugar palm can provide 60 different useful products. Sap to make sugar, vinegar, alcohol, bioethanol. The sap that can be refined to produce ethanol that can generate >5MW power. Leaf sheath to make durable rope that is sea water and fire resistant. Palm cabbage and buds served in salad or cooked. High-quality fibers are used in the bodies of luxury cars. Roots can cure kidney stones and as insect repellent. Boil young roots to soothe toothache. Powder from the leaves to make skin smoother. Wood for flooring and furniture. Barrels made from the stumps of the sugar palm. The wood in the outer ring and bottom of the sugar palms, especially for the trees have been tapped for a number of years, is extremely strong and durable - these termite proof stumps have been used as storage barrels in many places in Indonesia. [information extracted from Stichting Masarang]
- Sugar palm is the species of palm trees that can harvest sugar. Palm oil comes from another species of palm tree.
Palm oil is an ingredient used in a wide range of packaged food and cosmetics products such as cookies, bread, cereal, soap, and is one of the main causes of rainforest destruction.
Palm oil is usually labelled as "vegetable oil" and many consumers do not realise these products have helped to destroy a rainforest as forest land is turned into monoculture plantations to grow the world's cheapest vegetable oil.
Palm oil plantations have taken land from indigenous people, polluted air and rivers, and threatened the survival of the orangutans and other rare animals.
- Watch video "The Amazing Power of Sugar Palms".
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