Have you seen a bay leaf before or had a home cooked meal with bay leaves?
In my country, Nigeria, a lot of meals such as jollof rice or palm oil rice are cooked with this leaf. Basically any type of rice you cook should go well with this leaf to add flavor to the food.
You can even use it in cooking of red meat and poultry meat to draw out fats and oils (conversion of triglycerides to monounsaturated fats). This is an advantage to those who don’t want to gain extra weight but yet love their poultry meat.
Other health benefits of bay leaves includes: -
- Treatment of heartburn and constipation.
- Inhaling the boiled leaves is a rich source of vitamin C which helps in treatment of colds, flu and severe cough.
- Eliminates insomnia and anxiety.
- Production of insulin.
- Protects the heart from seizures and strokes as it contains cardiovascular protective compounds.
- Prevents the formation of cancer cells in the body as it is rich in caffeic acid, quercetin, eugenol and bartolinite.
- It lowers blood sugar.
- Drinking a cup of boiled bay leaves twice a day can regulate bowel movement, cure infections and break kidney stones.
DIFFERENT WAYS YOU CAN USE BAY LEAF
After washing gently with clean water:
- Put about 3 leaves into an average quantity of food. Do this when the food is almost done on fire.
- Grind it and sprinkle on your meat or any other food while cooking.
- Boil the leaves and inhale steam to get rid of phlegm or reduce severity of cough.
- You can also burn the leaf in your room to relieve stress and increase alertness.