The delicious saute of papaya flowers

If you eat papaya fruit, it may be normal. This time, if papaya flowers are made into food, who will eat it? In Indonesia, papaya flowers are often used as food or vegetables. Before that, you have to know in advance which papaya flowers can be eaten? Usually we wait for flowers to bear fruit. This one is a papaya without fruit but only the flowers.

In biology, papaya plants (Carica Papaya L) have 3 main types of papaya flowers or often called papaya sexes, namely male flowers, female flowers and male perfect flowers. The flowers whose shape is in accordance with the wishes of the market are sex perfect flowers or hermaphrodite flowers. This is a papaya flower that is shaped according to the market's wishes. Big fruit,good price, heavy weight. So, what is made as a vegetable is a male papaya flower.

This time I'm not talking about papaya fruit but about male papaya flowers which are processed into delicious vegetables as long as you know how to make them. Who ever cooked it? When planting papaya plants, if you see only flowers, don't be disappointed because the flowers can also be consumed.

Just like papaya leaves, papaya flowers also have a bitter taste when eaten. There is a special way to reduce or also get rid of the bitter taste in papaya leaves and flowers before they are processed into dishes.

There are several ways to reduce the bitter taste of papaya leaves or flowers that I have done :

• Pay attention to how to weed papaya flowers

  Papaya flowers are usually sold in the form still attached to the stem.

  Be sure to weed the flowers off the stems. Because the stems of this papaya flower are more bitter than the flowers.

  However, for those of you who like bitter, you can pick papaya flowers with young stems. The characteristics of the stems are light green, soft, and easy to pick.

• Squeeze the papaya flowers with salt

  The easiest way to get rid of the bitterness of papaya flowers is to clean the papaya flowers with salt.

  Using a large amount of salt, squeeze the papaya flowers slowly so they don't crumble.

• Mix guava leaves when boiling the flowers or papaya leaves. When the flowers or papaya leaves have slightly changed color. Drain, then discard the guava leaves and then wash the papaya flowers once while squeezing a little with gentle pressure so that the papaya flowers are not crushed or muddy.

• Another way to get rid of the bitter taste of papaya flowers is mixed with Ambarella, Otaheite apple / Great hot plum leaves. This method is what I often do as shown in the picture.

How to make stir-fried papaya flowers into delicious vegetables.

After the papaya flowers are boiled and drained like the step in point number 3 above. We prepare the spices according to the papaya flower dishes according to taste. There are many dishes made from papaya flowers. Some mix it with other vegetables or just papaya flowers.

Ayukyukyu-style papaya flower stir fry, the ingredients are:

• red chili

• green chili

• onion

• Garlic

• tomato

• Shrimp

• soybean paste in my country's language tauco.

Soy paste or tauco is an additional seasoning in fermented dishes and has a salty taste.

Chop all the spices above, stir-fry in hot oil, add prawns and then boiled and drained papaya flowers, add taoco, add a little sugar, chicken stock add enough water and not too much. Saute, until the water is slightly curdled and the papaya flowers are tender. Papaya leaf stir fry is ready to be served.

How, interested to make it? I hope this recipe information can add to your insight about cuisine, especially if you are a culinary lover.