Health Benefits of Adding Figs in Your Food

 What are the health benefits of adding Figs to your food intake?

The picture was taken from the pixel.com

This is my post for the letter F for the month-long A2Z writing challenge, and that for G is here.

This post considers the following facts about Figs.

• Description& History
• Did you Know?
• A product of South Africa
• Nutrition & Health Benefits
• Conclusion

Description & History

  It resembles a teardrop with hundreds of colourful tiny seeds and brown or green skin.  It is edible and mildly sweet.  Fig leaves are also edible and used in foods.  It is a fruit in the mulberry family.  

Fig is the oldest known fruit in the world, finding reference in the books of the Bible.  In the olden days, it was cultivated around the Aegean Sea and the Levant, Greeks were said to have received it from Caria. 

 Did you Know?

• Figs were known as the "poor man's fruit."
• The trees can grow to 100 feet tall.
• The fruits are mentioned in Bible.
• It is an excellent tenderizer in meat cooking and a flavour enhancer.
• Figs have mild laxative qualities.
• You can drink tea using dried fig leaves. 
• In Latin myth, the fig held a sacred place and was employed in religious ceremonies.

 Fig a South African Product

Fig grows in the Mediterranean climate.  It is cultivated in the Western Cape region with the Mediterranean climate.  Two or three varieties get cultivated here for exporting and for local markets.  The fruit is employed in salads, mains, and desserts. 

Nutrition & Health Benefits. 

• Nutrition

Fresh Fig is low in calories and rich in nutrients, making them a rich addition to foods.

One 40-gram fresh Fig contains calories 30; protein 0 grams, fat 0 grams, carbs 8 grams, fibre 1 gram, copper 3 per cent of the Daily Value, magnesium 3 per cent of the DV, potassium 3 per cent of the DV, riboflavin & Thiamine each 3 per cent of the DV, vitamin B6 3 percentage of the DV and vitamin K 3 per cent of the DV. 

This is the case with fresh Figs, whereas dried Figs are high in calories and rich in sugars as sugar concentrates as they dry. 

• Health Benefits

Promotes digestive health as 'bulk agents' and decreases constipation as a source for the healthy bacteria population populating your gut.

May help to improve vascular and heart health.

May help to manage blood sugar levels.  However, dry figs being high in sugar brings the opposite outcome, and their intake needs to be controlled. 

Has been proven in studies as having anticancer benefits.

May promote healthy skin.

The downside of eating Figs is being rich in Vitamin B can interfere with blood thinners, and caution should be taken there.  Also, people are allergic to fruit. 

Me and the Figs

Figs are not a staple food in our cultural habitat. I remember seeing a fig tree for the first time in the compound of a house we rented in the beginning years in Grahamstown (Makanda) with lofting large leaves.  Eagerness made me pluck a leaf when a drop of thick white stuff oozed at the nick, sticky latex-type stuff.  My search for fruits on the tree went futile; not all Fig trees are productive. 

Then when visiting a friend, I found a fruiting Fig in their yard.  Small pearl-shaped fruits at the nods, green, turning brown as they ripened. Chewing a piece of the fruit gave me a strange feeling of the tiny seeds rubbing my tongue.  

Slowly, I got tamed with the fruit.  Fresh fruit is not available in the open markets in selected shops. I use them as a snack, and Fig jam is my favourite.  

Conclusion:

Have you got fig fruits among your staple food?   And do you have any food experience with this Mediterranean fruit?

This blog is for the letter F in the series of my A2Z blog posts, lasting for the entire month and is part of the A2Z Blog chatter challenge.  To read earlier posts, click on these letters. A B C D E