Calabash Miracle Fruit

January 06, 2024

Calabash Miracle Fruit

I was introduced to this miracle fruit on the first Saturday of 2024 by my friend, Janny Kwan. She said this can do detox very well, just have to overcome the strange taste. She did not know the name at that time, so I googled it until I saw the same fruits in YouTube and got its name as Calabash fruit. She described it as look like pamelo with very hard skin that need to crack open, the white pulp very soft, boil with water for one hour, liquid is black and just drink 2 cups a day for detox.

Calabash orginated from Africa and it is famous for the use of the outerior skin as bowl, soup ladder and containers. The raw pulp can be poisonous if consumsed too much, they usually cook them with food. The shape of calabash can be many times. The one we are using are perfect round like pamelo.

How to extract the juice from Calabash

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KH6oHGQ4n6E

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MKNC_2TqDoA

This is a good blog post about what this fruit can do :

https://sennyong.blogspot.com/2011/06/detox-fruit-calabash-gourd-herbal-cure.html

My experiment :-

From a Facebook post who is selling the Calabash tree :-

CALABASH TREE

Scientific Name: Crescentia cujete

Botany

Cujete is a smooth, much-branched tree growing to a height of 4 to 5 meters. Branches are arching with close-set clusters of leaves. Leaves are alternate, often fascicled at the nodes, oblanceolate, 5 to 17 centimeters long, glossy at the upper surface, blunt at the tip and narrowed at the base. Flowers develop from the buds that grow from the main trunk, yellowish and sometimes veined with purple, with a slightly foetid odor, occuring singly or in pairs at the leaf axils, stalked and about 6 centimeters long, and opens in the evening. Calyx is about 2 centimters long, and split into two lobes. Fruit is short-stemmed, rounded, oval or oblong, green or purplish, 15 to 20 centimeters in diameter.

Distribution

- Occasionally cultivated for ornamental purposes.

- Recently introduced from tropical America.

Constituents

• Phytochemical studies of the fresh fruit pulp reports the presence of crescentic acid, tartaric acid, citric, and tannic acids, two resins and a coloring matter than resembles indigo.

• Studies yielded tartaric acid, cianhidric acid, citric acid, crescentic acid, tannins, beta-sitosterol, estigmasterol, alpha and beta amirina, estearic acid, palmitic acid.

• Study yielded flavonoids quercetin, apigenin with antiinflammatory, antihemorrahgic and anti-platelet aggregation activities.

• Leaves have yielded naptoquinones, iridoid glycosides, aucubin, plumieride, and asperuloside.

• Phytochemical study of the fruit yielded eight new compounds, along with four known compounds, acanthoside D, ß-D-glucopransoyl benzoate, (R)-1-0-ß-glucopyranosyl-1,3-octanediol.

• Fruit yielded four new 11-nor-iridoids: 6-O-p-hydroxybenzoyl-10-deoxyeucommiol, 6-O-benzoyl-10-deoxyeucommiol, 6-O-benzoyl-dihydrocatalpolgenine (a mixture of 3 and 4) with two known iridoids, ningpogenin and 6-O-p-hydroxybenzoylaucubin.

Properties

• Fruit considered aperient, laxative, expectorant.

• Considered anthelmintic, analgesic, antiinflammatory, febrifuge, laxative.

Parts used

Fruit, bark, leaves.

Uses

Folkloric

• In India, used as a pectoral, the poultice of pulp is applied to the chest.

• In the West Indies, syrup prepared from the pulp used for dysentery and as pectoral.

• In Rio de Janeiro, the alcoholic extract of the not-quite ripe fruit used to relieve constipation

• For erysipelas, the fresh pulp is boiled in water to form a black paste, mixed and boiled with vinegar, spread on linen for dermatologic application.

• The bark is used for mucoid diarrhea.

• Fruit pulp used as laxative and expectorant.

• In the Antilles and Western Africa, fruit pulp macerated in water is considered depurative, cooling and febrifuge, and applied to burns and headaches.

• In West Africa, fruit roasted in ashes is purgative and diuretic.

• In Sumatra, bark decoction used to clean wounds and pounded leaves used as poultice for headaches.

• Internally, leaves used as diuretic.

• Throughout the Carribean, used as analgesic and anti-inflammatory

• In the Antilles, fresh tops and leaves are ground and used as topicals for wounds and as cicatrizant.

• In Venezuela, decoction of bark used for diarrhea. Also, used to treat hematomas and tumors.

• In Costa Rica, used as purgative.

• In Cote-d'Ivoire, used for hypertension because of its diuretic effect.

• In Columbia, used for respiratory afflictions.

• In Vietnam, used as expectorant, antitussive, laxative and stomachic. Fruit decoction used to treat diarrhea, stomachaches, cold, bronchitis, cough, asthma, and urethritis.

• In Haiti, the fruit of Crescentia cujete is part of the herbal mixtures reported in its traditional medicine. In the province of Camaguey in Cuba, is considered a panacea.

• In Panama, where it is called totumo, the fruit is used for diarrhea and stomachaches. Also for respiratory ailments, bronchitis, cough, colds, toothaches. headaches, menstrual irregularities; as laxative, antiinflammatory, febrifuge. The leaves are used for hypertension.

Others

• In some countries, the dried shell of the fruit is used to make bowls and fruit containers, decorated with paintings or carvings.

• Used in making maracas or musical rattle..

• In Brazil, the fibrous lining of the fruit is sometimes used as a substitute for cigarette paper.

• A favorite perch for orchids.

Studies

• Phytochemicals: (1) Previous studies have yielded naphthoquinones and iridoid glucosides. The fruits yielded 15 new compounds, 3 iridoid glucosides, five iridoids, 3 2,4-pentanediol glycosides, along with known compounds. (2) Study fruit constituents yielded 16 iridoids and iridoid glucosides,

• Nutritive and Anti-Nutritive Composition of Calabash Fruit: Pulp was found to have high mineral concentrations; sodium, highest; calcium, lowest, with high values of thiamine and found to be free from HCN toxicity and suggests useful contributions to human health and nutrition.

• Bioactive Furanonaphthoquinones : Study isolated new and known bioactive compounds showing selective activity toward DNA-repair-deficient yeast mutants.

• Antibacterial: (1) In a study of extracts against E. coli and S. aureus, Crescentia cujete showed activity against S. aureus. (2) Among several solvents used, only the ethanol extracts showed significant antimicrobial activity against Shigella dysenteriae, Bacillus cereus, B. subtilis, B. megaterium and Staphylococcus aureus.

• Snake Venom Neutralizing Effect: In a study of t5 plant extracts used by traditional healers in Colombia for snakebites, 31 had moderate to high neutralizing ability against the hemorrhagic effect of Bothrops atrox venom. C cujete (unripe fruits) was one of 19 that showed moderate neutralization.

• Antidiabetic: In a non experimental validation for antidiabetic activity, study yields cyanhidric acid believed to stimulate insulin release.