Drumstick

Botanical Name: Moringa Oleifera

Common names: horseradish tree, benoil tree

Other vernaculars: Hindi-muranka, Kannada-moringa, Marathi-shevga chi seeng, Tamil-murungai, Gujarati-seeng ni phali, Malayalam-sigru , Telugu-sajana, Bengali-sajna.

The drumstick tree or horseradish tree (Moringa oleifera) is one of the commonest trees in India. It is distributed in the wild in the sub-Himalayan tract and cultivated widely throughout India.

It is a small to medium sized elegant tree. The bark is thick, soft, corky and deeply fissured. The leaves, tri-pinnated with elliptical leaflets, are fern-like. Its flowers are white and fragrant and appear in large panicles while the fruits are triangular, ribbed pods with winged seeds. Some varieties found in south India grow pods longer than one metre!

The greenskinned, tough, 1-2 feet long, sticklike vegetable, is surprisingly soft and fleshy inside. The opaque white flesh, embedded with pea-like seeds, covered in layers of skins, is sweetish, fragrant, and tasty to eat, when cooked.

They get their name from the fact that they do resemble the musical drumsticks.

As a general rule, the hard ridges of the drumsticks should be scraped with a peeler, but do not over peel, as the vegetable will become difficult to cook and stir. The skin should also be intact to enable eating the fleshy part, when cooked, or the skin wills break and one cannot enjoy it to the fullest.

Ideal size of drumstick pieces, are about 2-1/2 inches in length.