Hyderabad celebrates jamun season: Creative tangy recipes serve sweet nostalgia, health boosters

Hyderabad: One of the best memories of childhood in Hyderabad for many is sitting under the jamun tree and eating the unwashed fruit with salt or black salt until tongues turned purple.

This year, jamuns have come in early, and many of us have gone forward from eating raw fruits to testing recipes: jamun juice, smoothies, raitas, dips and jams have all been tried and tested, even jamun cheesecake, which looks like a blueberry cheesecake and tastes divine.

The divine jamun

Jamun or Indian blackberry is also called Jambu in Gujarati, Jamun in Hindi and Marathi, Perinnaral in Malayalam, Jamo in Oriya, Neredum in Tamil, Kalajam in Bengali, Neereedi in Telugu and black plum or Java plum in English.

Medicinal uses

Every part of the jamun tree is said to have medicinal uses: its fruit, its seed, bark and leaves. The fruit is rich in manganese, zinc, iron, calcium, sodium and potassium, all of which play an important role in various bodily functions.

Traditional Indian medicines like Ayurveda and Unani prescribe jamun for different health problems, including diabetes, dental issues, digestive disorders, liver trouble and skin ailments. While the fruit is rich in antioxidants like tannic and oxalic acids, the bark has digestive properties.

The seed is prescribed for diabetes. The seeds of jamun are dried and ground to a powder, strained and consumed in small quantities with water every day to regulate blood sugar levels. The leaves of the jamun are said to be a natural antibiotic. Jamun seed powder is also used to help in clearing skin blemishes left by acne and blackheads.

This fruit is a boon for diabetics as the enzyme ‘jamboline’ helps to control the blood sugar levels.

The art of cutting jamun

Chopping black jamun is an art.

Do not select an over-ripe fruit. Wash well, drain and de-seed each jamun fruit by carefully slitting one side and pulling out the seed inside. Then, chop the fruit roughly or finely as required. You can even take out its pulp as per the recipe.

Here are some recipes using jamun, including a sugar-free ice cream recipe.

Jamun Raita

Ingredients

2 cups of ripe jamun fruit

2 cups yoghurt.

1 teaspoon fresh grated coconut

Salt to taste

Seasoning: 1 tsp oil, ¼ teaspoon mustard seeds, a pinch of hing (asafetida), a few curry leaves and 1 dried red chilli.

Method:

Chop the jamun fruit into tiny chunks. Mix the fruit with yoghurt and add salt.

Fry all the ingredients of the seasoning in the oil. Add the seasoning to the yoghurt, mix and serve it with lime rice or eat it in the same form as a snack.

Jamun Dip

Ingredients:

1 cup ripe black jamuns, de-seeded and finely chopped

½ cup grated cheese

2 cups beaten yoghurt

1 teaspoon roasted cumin powder,

½ tsp black pepper

1 bunch chopped green coriander

Salt to taste

Method:

Mix all these ingredients and serve with chips or vegetables like cucumber, carrot and celery.

Jamun Jam

Ingredients:

1 kilo jamun

The quantity of sugar will be half the measurement of the weight of the juice extracted. For example, if the juice is 800 g, add 400 g of sugar.

1 level teaspoon Citric Acid

Method:

Wash the jamun fruits and put them in a pan. Add water just enough to cover the fruits. Add Citric Acid to it and boil for 20 minutes. Let them cool. Squeeze the juice out of the fruits in water and sieve it. Remove the seeds and discard the skins.

Add sugar and cook the juice on a medium flame. Stir continuously. The juice will slowly thicken into a jam consistency. To check whether the juice has reached the correct consistency, drop a small quantity in cold water. If it sinks to the bottom as a single blob, it means the jam is ready. Remove from heat and store in glass jars.

Jamun sugar-free ice cream

Ingredients:

1/2-liter low-fat milk

2 tablespoons corn flour

2 cups jamun, de-seeded and chopped

5 teaspoons sugar substitute (to taste)

Method:

Mix the corn flour in ½ cup of cold milk and keep aside. Bring the remaining milk to a boil in a non-stick pan and add the corn flour mixture. Stir continuously and simmer over a slow flame till the mix coats the back of a spoon. Cool and add the sugar substitute and the jamun. Mix well and pour into a freezer container. Freeze overnight.

Liquidise in a blender till it is slushy and pour back into the same container. Freeze till the ice cream is set. Taste the ice-cream mixture as you add each spoonful or sachet of the sugar substitute to see how much you actually need for the correct amount of sweetness.