Many of us have known the impressive health benefits of coconut. It is time to know more about available coconut-based products in the market. We should know which product to purchase and to look out for. There are so many health benefits we can get from coconut and we should be excited to use them:
• Brown coconut:
Coconut is often sold in the market without its outer layer and with its inner shells that protect the meat and water. Before choosing these hairy coconuts, we should look at three holes on the shells and make sure that they are mouldy. This makes sure that the coconut is a good condition.
• Young coconut water:
Young coconut has nutritious water inside its shells. Many food producers sell young coconut water inside containers. It is preferable to choose containers with cardboard, because aluminium containers may contaminate the coconut water.
• Coconut butter or cream:
Whether the coconut takes shape as copra or flakes, they still contain some amount cream. Coconut cream is reasonably thick and has cream-like consistency. Compared to typical nut-based butter, coconut butter has lower calorific content and we should consider using it for various purposes.
• Coconut oil:
Like many plant-based food source, we can also extract oil from coconut. It is a good idea to choose coconut oil in glass bottles, because some plastic containers could dissolve a little when in contact with coconut oil.
• Coconut powder:
Coconut powder is produced from copra and can be used for many purposes, such as cooking.
• Coconut flakes:
Coconut flakes are shredded copra and are useful as baking ingredients. Cakes and biscuits with shredded coconut in it are quite tasty.
Because many people don’t live in areas where coconuts are available naturally, it could be confusing for them to use coconut properly. Here are a few tips on using coconut:
• How to open coconut? Opening coconut should be very easy. We can use a machete or butcher knife to open a young coconut by chopping it up. We should be very careful when doing this, because it is easy to injure ourselves. We should press the coconut firmly to the ground, while making sure that our fingers are not near the point where the machete will strike. The machete itself should be sharp and not too light, so we can complete the job with only a few chops. We can put the water of young coconut in a container for subsequent use.
• How to obtain the flesh:
Again, we should do this carefully with a sharp machete. Use spoon to remove the young meat. We can put the meat into the coconut water and consume them together after some sugar, tiny amount of salt and lime juice are added.
• How to use the white flesh:
We can blend the flesh of old coconut with food processor and change it into coconut milk. It can be shredded and we can use it as cooking ingredients.
• How to use the coconut cream? Coconut cream can be consumed with bread or cake. Many people also use it ingredients for desserts or baking.
• How to use the coconut oil? Coconut oil can be used as frying oil. It can also be used as salad dressing and it may also nourish our skin when applied directly.