Gourd means the crop plant in the family Cucurbitaceae. It is often confused with bottle gourd or Lauki, that’s one of the most popular kinds of gourds in India but little did we know there are lots of top and best gourd vegetables to eat. These include pumpkins, cucumbers, squash, luffa and melons. They are used in vegetables, stews, soups, and salads. You can devour them raw, as well as in cooked form. The gourd vegetables of India are loaded with nutrition, vitamins, carbohydrates, minerals so on and so forth. Top 10 Most Popular Gourd Vegetables of India.
Table of Contents
Here are the Top 10 Most Popular Gourd Vegetables of India.
Bitter Gourd
Momordica charantia or karela is one of the top most popular gourd vegetables in India. Karela is named so because of its origin in the south Indian country of Kerala. It is a tropical or subtropical vine of the gourd family. The fruit has a wonderful warty exterior and a rectangular shape. It is hollow in cross-section, with a relatively thin layer of flesh surrounding an important seed cavity filled with large, seeds and pith. The vegetable is often eaten green, or it is beginning to show yellow.
This gourd is best for weight loss and aids blood purification. It also helps in handling intestine health and strengthens the immune system. Bitter gourd is typically eaten throughout India. In North Indian cuisine, its miles are regularly served with yoghurt at the side to offset the bitterness.
In traditional remedies of India, different parts of the plant are used as claimed treatments for diabetes, and as a stomachic, laxative, antibilious, emetic, anthelmintic agent, for the treatment of cough, respiratory diseases, skin diseases, wounds, ulcer, gout, and rheumatism. Over the years it is known as the top most popular gourd vegetables of India.
Ridge Gourds
Ridge gourds are one of the top gourd vegetables in India. They are long greens with ridged dark green skin and white spongy flesh that contains numerous seeds inside. They are wealthy in fibre and really best in Indian cooking. They are utilized in various ways in the cuisines of various states. The vegetable thrives in tropical and sub-tropical environmentsbeing indigenous to Asian countries like China, India, Nepal, Indonesia and the Philippines.
Madhya Pradesh, Orrisa, and Maharashtra are the main producers of these gourds. This green fleshy vegetable has an intrinsically bland and insipid taste. Hence, it’s far typically used to prepare many customary “desi” dishes such as pakoras, sambhar, dal, chutney and raita, after being adequately seasoned with spices, to enhance its flavour.
They are rich in a vast array of vital components like dietary fibres, water content, diet A, diet C, iron, magnesium and diet B6. They are clearly low in calorie content, bad saturated fat and cholesterol. Furthermore, they abound in potent antioxidants and alkaloid compounds, which regulate metabolism and eliminate toxins from the body which makes it as one of the top most gourd vegetables of India.
Pointed Gourd
Pointed gourd, is one of the top most gourd vegetables in India. It is a monoecious vine plant with heart-shaped leaves and is grown on a trellis. The pointed gourd is a vine that is available in green colour, with white stripes over it. Size can range from small and round to thick and long 2 to 6 inches. It thrives properly under a warm to moderately warm and humid climate.
It is extensively cultivated in the eastern and a few northern parts of India, particularly in Northeastern Andhra, Odisha, Bengal, Assam, Bihar, and Uttar Pradesh. It is used as an ingredient for soup, stew, curry, sweet, or eaten fried and as potoler dorma or dolma with fish, roe or meat stuffing. Parval is likewise used to make kalonji, deep-fried delicacies full of spices. It also serves as a best medicinal drug for various diseases.
It is a superb supply of nutrients and minerals. It is a top source of carbohydrates, diet A, and diet C. It also carries major vitamins and lines factors which are needed in fewer quantities for playing essential roles in. That’s why it is one of the top most gourd vegetables of India.
Ash Gourd
Benincasa hispida, the wax gourd, also called ash gourd, is one of the top most gourd vegetables of India. The fruit is covered in a fuzzy coating of fine hairs when young. The immature melon has thick white flesh that tastes sweet. By maturity, the fruit loses its hair and develops a waxy coating, giving rise to the name wax gourd.
The wax coating helps to present the fruit long shelf life of up to a year. It is one of the Indian subcontinent have a white coating with a rough texture. It is one of the top few vegetables available during winter in regions of deciduous vegetation. In Indian cuisine, it is historically used to put together a huge style of dishes.
In north India, it is used to prepare a sweet called petha. The wax gourd is diagnosed for its medicinal properties in the Ayurvedic system of medicine. It is highly filled with nutrients, facilitates in fighting acidity, and belly ulcers and also keeps the intestine healthy. Moreover, it is the best gourd vegetable in India.
Sponge Gourd
Luffa aegyptiaca, or sponge gourd is one of the top gourd vegetables of India. It is a cylindrical fruit which grows on a climbing, herbaceous vine. It has easy, green skin when young, and can feature ridges or ridge traces that run across the skin of the fruit.
The seeds also are fit to be eaten but are usually removed earlier than the flesh is eaten. The interior flesh of the gourd is easy and creamy white. It is loaded with vitamins such as dietary fibre, vitamin C, vitamin A, riboflavin, zinc, thiamine, iron and magnesium.
The Sponge gourd fruit has been located to have antioxidant, antibacterial and antifungal properties. This round and rigged gourd have diverse medicinal uses in Ayurveda. Besides blood purification and skin treatment, it’s also beneficial in curing inflammation and constipation. Moreover, it is the best gourd vegetable in India.
Spine Gourd
Momordica dioica, or spine gourd is one of the top most gourd vegetables of India. It is also called bristly balsam pear, is a species of flowering plant in the Cucurbitaceae/gourd family. Furthermore, the industrial cultivation of backbone gourd happens withinside the country of Uttar Pradesh, Chhattisgarh, Orrisa, and Maharashtra.
It has small leaves and small yellow flowers, and it has small, darkish green, round or oval fruits. It is dioecious, which means that it has distinct male and female individual organisms, hence its name. It is used as a vegetable in all areas of India and some parts of South Asia. It is available in India mostly around monsoon season.
Besides being rich in proteins and vitamins, it has very much less amount of calories, thus, serving as excellent diet food. It also reduces blood sugar levels in diabetic patients since it is rich in plant insulin. Vegetables loaded with fibers and with water content are great choices for a diabetic diet. Moreover it is one of the top most gourd vegetables of India.
Ivy Gourd
Coccinia grandis, or ivy gourd is one of the top most gourd vegetables in India. It grows mainly in the southern states of India. This vegetable resembles watermelon and grows fast as a climber. The vegetable grows to about 4 inches a day. It has attractive flowers. Leaves are traded along the stems, heart-shaped to 5-lobed, up to ten cm lengthy and wide, and bushy below.
Tendrils from leaf axils assist climbingIvy gourd leaves when eaten raw offer the best benefits. The ivy gourd plant is thought to improve metabolism, reduce blood sugar levels, and prevent conditions like diabetes. It is also very good for the heart and the nervous system. It is rich in beta-carotene which ensures the best functioning of the heart and prevents heart ailments.
This fruit additionally called infant watermelon gives a delicious flavour and loads of critical nutrients, minerals, and vitamins. Studies have even proven that it helps deal with kidney stones. Ivy gourd does now no longer cause side effects if it’s miles cleaned, boiled or cooked. The entire ivy gourd vegetable is consumed in a few regions, while only the shoots are eaten in other parts of the globe. Coccinia Grandi vegetable is widely cultivated in China, Cambodia, Myanmar, and Africa. Overall is one of the best gourd vegetables of India.
Bottle Gourd
Calabash also known as bottle gourd is one of the top most gourd vegetables of India. Bottle Gourd is known to be one of the healthiest veggies. Bottle Gourd is also a versatile vegetable and has large water content. Calabash fruits have a variety of shapes huge and rounded bottle-shaped and serpentine, and also they can end up over a metre lengthy.
They are quick-growing annuals with bushy stems, lengthy forked tendrils, and a musky odour. Many forms of the bottle gourd were cultivated for specific purposes, and the sizes of bottle gourd and flowers, as well as the sizes and shapes of the fruits, range greatly. Loaded with minerals, bottle gourd maintains your body hydrated.
Also known as Lauki in India, this veggie is a best source of diet C, K and calcium. In the nation of Maharashtra in India, a similar preparation called dudhi chana is popular. The skin of the vegetable is utilized in creating a dry highly spiced chutney preparation.
It is eaten up in Assam with fish curry, as boiled vegetable curry and also fried with potato and tomatoes. lauki kheer is a dessert from Telangana, usually prepared for festive occasions. Due to the various uses and benefits of Bottle Gourd, it is one of the top most gourd vegetables in India.
Apple Gourd
Praecitrullus fistulosus, typically referred to as Tinda, is one of the top most gourd vegetables in India. It is a squash-like cucurbita vegetable grown mainly famous in South Asia. Apple Gourd is popularly known as ‘Tinda’ in India. The plant is also prickly with small thorns just like the zucchini. The fruit is about spherical, and 5–8 cm in diameter. This vegetable is mainly famous in South Asia.
Tinda is used on a big scale in the Northern parts of India in curries. The plant of the apple gourd is pricky with small thorns. The Apple Gourd is said to be native to India. Due to the diverse health benefits and uses of the Apple Gourd, Apple Gourd export from India has been on a rise. Moreover one of the top most gourd vegetables of India.
Snake Gourd
Trichosanthes cucumerina is one of the top most gourd vegetables of India. Its variety T. cucumerina var. angina raised for its strikingly lengthy fruit. It is a monoecious annual vine climbing by tendrils. Leaves are palmately lobed, up to twenty-five cm lengthy. Flowers are unisexual, white, opening at night time, with lengthy branching hairs at the margins of the petals.
The hairs are curled during the daytime when the flower is closed but unfurl at night time to shape a sensitive lacy display. The leaves and shoots are edible, and the pulp of mature fruits is sometimes eaten as a tomato substitute. These gourds are lengthy and narrow in shape, full of vitamins and minerals, and function a best source of energy.
They make a vital part of Maharashtrian cuisine. They are eaten as a vegetable whilst very young, even though they each taste rather bland. As snake gourds get older, their flesh turns into tougher and greater bitter and their rind turns dark red and hardens. Moreover it is one of the best gourd vegetables of India.
Faq related to Top 10 Most Popular Gourd Vegetables of India
How many gourd vegetables are there?
The gourd family, Cucurbitaceae, encompasses five vegetable crops of worldwide importance.
What are gourd vegetables?
Pumpkins, cucumbers, squash, luffa, and melons.
Which gourd is best?
- Apple
- Daisy
- Extra Long Handle Dipper
What are the three types of gourds?
Ornamental, utilitarian, and vegetable gourds
What is the largest type of gourd?
The Chinese gourd
What is the healthiest gourd?
Ridge Gourd
Where are gourds grown India?
Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Punjab, Tamil Nadu, Kerala, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, West Bengal, Odisha, Assam Uttar Pradesh and Bihar.
Which gourd is good for diabetes?
Ash gourd
Which variety of bitter gourd is best?
Momordica charantia
Conclusion
As for the final say these are some of the top gourd vegetables of India. As they are grown around the world and consumed in different forms with tons of recipes. It is also widely used for medicines. These greens are good to eat and are enriched lots nutrients and vitamins. They are good for health providing lots of benefits.
