[Goanet]CASHEW FRUIT (CAJU) - PART II
CASHEW FENNI (CAJUNCHI FENNI) In Goa, two types of liquor are available Indian Made Foreign Liquor (IMFL), and locally brewed Palm and Cashew Fenni. While the former is used throughout Goa, the latter is more famous in Bardez. Just like urrak, cashew fenni tastes best when had neat. Most Goan farmers and laborers drink cashew fenni neat and mostly they finish a kals (cup) of fenni in one gulp, which is not the way to have a drink but if it suits them, fine! Generally, Goans are slow drinkers. To begin with, a good drinker may take as much as half an hour to drink a neat or diluted peg of cashew fenni. He, however, picks up pace as he continues to drink and may, at a later stage, refill his glass every 15 minutes or less, depending on his capacity to drink. The middle class and elite Goans also drink cashew fenni neat, but many prefer to dilute it with water, soda or a soft drink. In the 1960s and 1970s many used Dr. Jack Sequeiras Coca Cola to dilute cashew fenni. A good cashew fenni drinker always likes to find out the quality of the fenni he is about to consume and he does it as follows: He pours fenni in a glass and takes a small sip before it is mixed with anything. He leaves the sip on the tongue for a while and then gulps it down. This simple process enables him to comment on the quality of the fenni. If the fenni is adulterated, he feels the burning sensation travel down his throat and through the chest, thus confirming inferiority of the fenni. The other method to test the fenni is to dip the middle finger in a cup/glass of fenni (before it is mixed with anything,) light a match stick and set fire to the finger. If the fenni is strong and is of good quality, the finger immediately catches fire; if not, it wont, thus proving that the fenni is weak and of inferior quality. Just like brandy, cashew fenni is hot and produces heat in the body. It is in fact a winter/monsoon drink. For example, if you are drenched in the rain and take a shot of neat cashew fenni as soon as you enter the house/bar, it immediately creates heat in your body and makes you feel warm. Cashew fenni is like tequila; it tastes good when taken neat. The Mexicans go wild when they have a shot of tequila and begin to fire their revolver/gun at an opponent at the least provocation; Goans turn into tigers when they have a shot of fenni and think nobody can defy them while their partner (fenni) is with them! Many people drink cashew fenni during the summer and complain of unbearable heat and thats because they keep on creating heat in their bodies! Cashew fenni is a beautiful drink but its odour is extremely strong. One can never deny having consumed cashew fenni. Not only that, if you are a regular cashew fenni drinker, even your clothes smell of the fenni! In the 1950s and 1960s some doctors in Goa prescribed cashew fenni as a medicine. If anyone went to a doctor with low blood pressure, the doctor would immediately ask him if he drank liquor. If the answer was negative, he would not prescribe him medicine but would just ask him to take half a peg or a full peg (depending on the build of the person) of cashew fenni before meals the result: Blood pressure would be normal within a day or two! Some doctors in Goa still prescribe cashew fenni as a medicine. In the olden days, the cashew fenni was also used as a treatment for colds. Whenever one had a bad chest cold, the parents or the elderly would give him/her Ulpailolo Cajuncho soro (burnt cashew fenni) as per the following process: They would pour a kals (cup) or two of cashew fenni in a vattli (brass plate), add a tablespoon or two of sugar and stir it until it was dissolved. They would then crush pepper seeds on a fatorn and spill the powder in the vattli. A match stick would then be lit and fire set to the fenni in the vattli - since the fenni then was of good quality, it never failed to catch fire. The fenni was left to boil and burn until it was reduced to half its original quantity. We would then extinguish the fire, place our face close to the vattli and inhale the hot vapor through nose. We would then take a teaspoon and enjoy every bit of the processed fenni medicine. We would repeat the process for two or three nights and, believe me, the chest cold would be gone by then. I still use this formula whenever I have a bad chest cold when home on vacation. In the olden days, a bad cold was also treated with a mixture of cashew fenni and egg called tantiachem massad which was prepared as follows: Break an egg and separate the albumen from the yolk. Place the yolk in a bowl, add a tablespoon sugar and beat it until it turns thin. Then add half or a full peg of cashew fenni, mix it well and drink it just as you would have a drink. Continue the massad for three days, and your cold is bound to disappear. The massad is to be taken early in the morning before you
[Goanet]CASHEW FRUIT (CAJU) - PART I
The cashew is a plant native to northeastern Brazil where it is called by its Portuguese name Cajú (the fruit) or Cajueiro (the tree.) It was brought to Goa at the end of the fifteenth century where it soon became naturalized due to compatible warm and humid climate. In addition to being delicious, cashew fruit is a rich source of vitamins, minerals, and other essential nutrients. It has up to five times more vitamin C than oranges and contains a high amount of mineral salts. Volatile compounds present in the fruit include esters, terpenes, and carboxylic acids. Some people are allergic to cashews but cashews are a less frequent allergen than some other nuts. The seed is surrounded by a double shell containing a caustic phenolic resin. The bark and leaves of cashew tree are used medicinally. They are a rich source of tannins, a group of plant chemicals with documented biological activity; hence, Anacardic acids are found in cashews with their highest concentration in the nutshells. Cashew plants are usually grown from seeds. They begin bearing the second year, are in full production by the 10th year, and continue bearing for another 20 years. The yield varies from 1 to 100 pounds per tree. Cashew fruit ripens in 2 to 3 months and is harvested from the tree or picked up soon after falling. Cashew fruit contain a potent skin irritant toxin called urushiol within the dark green nut shells. This must be removed when the seed inside is processed for consumption; this is done by hulling the nuts, a somewhat hazardous process. Exceedingly painful skin burns (similar to poison ivy burns) among processing workers are frequent. In the past, cashew fruit juice was used to treat influenza, and people also brewed a tea of leaves and bark to treat diarrhea and colic in infants. Caju is one of the best fruits that I like during the summer. There are many types of caju vhoddle caju (large cashew), lhan caju (small cashew), holdulle caju (yellow cashew), tambdde caju (red cashew), rosall caju (juicy cashew), dikalle caju, etc. A ripe cashew plucked from a tree tastes the best. I can never resist the temptation of plucking a good, ripe cashew from a tree. Whenever I travel by motorbike or car while on vacation in Goa, my eyesight is always set on the roadside cashew trees. As soon as I see a ripe cashew on a tree, I stop my motorbike or if traveling by car I ask the driver to stop the car and proceed to the tree. If the cashew is on a lower branch, I try to pluck it by bending the branch. If it is on a high branch, I pick up a stone, aim at it and am mostly able to bring it down with the first hit, which not only makes me feel good but also takes me back to my childhood. If I dont succeed in bringing down the cashew within a couple of attempts, I climb the trunk and shake the branch, collect the cashew, wash it with water, hold the cashew by its seed, bite off the stem area and throw it out and place the whole cashew (depending on its size) into my mouth, at the same time twisting and removing the seed and making sure that juice does not run out of my mouth and fall on my clothes as once it dries it creates stains which cannot easily be removed. Although we have cashew trees on our hilly plot, the norm in childhood was to steal from a neighbor's compound. That created an adventure for us and we enjoyed it very much. The best time to eat cashews is early in the morning from dawn until 9:00 a.m., after which time they become hot and not so pleasant to eat. RAW CASHEW SEEDS (FOKAM) Besides cashew seeds, which is a great business in Goa, we also have FOKAM or BIBE (raw cashew seeds.) As children we ate a lot of fokam, especially those who had cashew trees of their own. Whenever we were hungry, we would visit our properties or the hill, pick up fokam from unripe cashews on a tree and remove the inner kernel as follows: Take two small dry sticks Hold them in each hand Place the fok (raw cashew seed) flat on the ground and remove the eye from the middle of the seed with a stick Place the fok on the ground on its back and keep the big thumb of your right foot on its lower part Make a gash in the middle on the upper tip of the fok Hold a dry stick in each hand and place both sticks into the gash with cross hands Apply pressure in opposite directions until the shell tears apart Place the right hand stick under the kernel and lift it up Keep aside removed seeds Once through the lot, clean the seeds with a cloth and peel off the skin and enjoy eating them. Please keep in mind that fokancho/bibeancho dik (cardol) is very caustic it even creates boils on the skin. In the olden days, the toxic oil from cashew nuts was used as external worm medicine to kill botfly larvae under the skin. The shell provides insect-repelling vesicant oil which in the olden days was applied to roof wood to protect it from white ants.
Re: [Goanet]CASHEW FRUIT (CAJU!)
On Sun, 30 Jan 2005 21:06:52 +0300, domnic fernandes [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: The cashew is a plant native to northeastern Brazil where it is called by its Portuguese name Cajú (the fruit) or Cajueiro (the tree.) It was brought to Goa at the end of the fifteenth century where it soon became naturalized Comment: Perhaps it was at the end of the sixttenth century? Cheers, Gabe
[Goanet]CASHEW FRUIT (CAJU!)
The cashew is a plant native to northeastern Brazil where it is called by its Portuguese name Cajú (the fruit) or Cajueiro (the tree.) It was brought to Goa at the end of the fifteenth century where it soon became naturalized due to compatible warm and humid climate. In addition to being delicious, cashew fruit is a rich source of vitamins, minerals, and other essential nutrients. It has up to five times more vitamin C than oranges and contains a high amount of mineral salts. Volatile compounds present in the fruit include esters, terpenes, and carboxylic acids. Some people are allergic to cashews but cashews are a less frequent allergen than some other nuts. The seed is surrounded by a double shell containing a caustic phenolic resin. The bark and leaves of cashew tree are used medicinally. They are a rich source of tannins, a group of plant chemicals with documented biological activity; hence, Anacardic acids are found in cashews with their highest concentration in the nutshells. Cashew plants are usually grown from seeds. They begin bearing the second year, are in full production by the 10th year, and continue bearing for another 20 years. The yield varies from 1 to 100 pounds per tree. Cashew fruit ripens in 2 to 3 months and is harvested from the tree or picked up soon after falling. Cashew fruit contain a potent skin irritant toxin called urushiol within the dark green nut shells. This must be removed when the seed inside is processed for consumption; this is done by hulling the nuts, a somewhat hazardous process. Exceedingly painful skin burns (similar to poison ivy burns) among processing workers are frequent. In the past, cashew fruit juice was used to treat influenza, and people also brewed a tea of leaves and bark to treat diarrhea and colic in infants. Caju is one of the best fruits that I like during the summer. There are many types of caju vhoddle caju (large cashew), lhan caju (small cashew), holdulle caju (yellow cashew), tambdde caju (red cashew), rosall caju (juicy cashew), dikalle caju, etc. A ripe cashew plucked from a tree tastes the best. I can never resist the temptation of plucking a good, ripe cashew from a tree. Whenever I travel by motorbike or car while on vacation in Goa, my eyesight is always set on the roadside cashew trees. As soon as I see a ripe cashew on a tree, I stop my motorbike or if traveling by car I ask the driver to stop the car and proceed to the tree. If the cashew is on a lower branch, I try to pluck it by bending the branch. If it is on a high branch, I pick up a stone, aim at it and am mostly able to bring it down with the first hit, which not only makes me feel good but also takes me back to my childhood. If I dont succeed in bringing down the cashew within a couple of attempts, I climb the trunk and shake the branch, collect the cashew, wash it with water, hold the cashew by its seed, bite off the stem area and throw it out and place the whole cashew (depending on its size) into my mouth, at the same time twisting and removing the seed and making sure that juice does not run out of my mouth and fall on my clothes as once it dries it creates stains which cannot easily be removed. Although we have cashew trees on our hilly plot, the norm in childhood was to steal from a neighbor's compound. That created an adventure for us and we enjoyed it very much. The best time to eat cashews is early in the morning from dawn until 9:00 a.m., after which time they become hot and not so pleasant to eat. RAW CASHEW SEEDS (FOKAM) Besides cashew seeds, which is a great business in Goa, we also have FOKAM or BIBE (raw cashew seeds.) As children we ate a lot of fokam, especially those who had cashew trees of their own. Whenever we were hungry, we would visit our properties or the hill, pick up fokam from unripe cashews on a tree and remove the inner kernel as follows: Take two small dry sticks Hold them in each hand Place the fok (raw cashew seed) flat on the ground and remove the eye from the middle of the seed with a stick Place the fok on the ground on its back and keep the big thumb of your right foot on its lower part Make a gash in the middle on the upper tip of the fok Hold a dry stick in each hand and place both sticks into the gash with cross hands Apply pressure in opposite directions until the shell tears apart Place the right hand stick under the kernel and lift it up Keep aside removed seeds Once through the lot, clean the seeds with a cloth and peel off the skin and enjoy eating them. Please keep in mind that fokancho/bibeancho dik (cardol) is very caustic it even creates boils on the skin. In the olden days, the toxic oil from cashew nuts was used as external worm medicine to kill botfly larvae under the skin. The shell provides insect-repelling vesicant oil which in the
