The Many Delicious Uses and Health Benefits of Bimbli
With fruit that looks a bit like small gherkins or cucumbers, bimbli is a traditional souring agent of choice across various tropical countries that is now making its way from heritage recipes from Malaysia, Indonesia, Sri Lanka and India to modern culinary experiments all-over South-East Asia.
I can’t tell you exactly when I heard about the bimbli tree for the first time, but after four years of living in Goa, and befriending a number of Goans along the way, I’m certain that there were a number of conversations during which I absentmindedly picked up the word ‘bimbli’ and got acquainted with how the fruit, and the tree it grows on, look. How else would I have known to point at the dark-brown-barked tree, that stood in a corner by the boundary wall in the garden of a friend’s newly-rented home, while discussing the frondescence all around in that large, stereotypically Goan garden, and respond promptly “That one is a bimbli tree.”
Staring at the bimbli tree that day, I felt a sense of déjà vu. I was transported back to the tiny, ground-floor home of my mother’s eldest brother, my Ashok mama. This was during the 90s. While my mother caught up with my aunt and uncle, I entertained myself by walking around in the society compound outside, with nothing other than a starfruit tree to busy myself with. I observed the trunk, the leaves, the branches and then made calculated moves to pluck the lowest hanging fruit so I could savour the sourness of the kamrakh or carambola fruit. The first time I tasted raw bimbli, my tastebuds tingled with this memory from decades ago — the tanginess of starfruit from a tree in Santacruz, Mumbai. I also saw a resemblance in the long, pointed, bright green leaves of both trees. I went on to learn that the Averrhoa bilimbi is in fact a close cousin of the Averrhoa carambola.
The bimbli tree is also known as the sorrel tree and is a regular feature in most Goan homes, usually found grown close to the well. Perhaps, this is by design — more water leads to bigger, juicier fruits. Grown as a backyard tree in India, Sri Lanka and Myanmar, the bimbli tree grows almost wild in other countries in South East Asia such as Thailand, Indonesia and Philippines. Apart from Asia, this tropical fruit tree is also found in Africa. Bimbli trees fruit almost all year round, giving bumper crops when it is hottest, and barely any fruit during the monsoon.
Finding the Perfect Uses for Bimbli in Your Kitchen
While bimblis can be extremely sour to bite into, chef and food entrepreneur Shriya Shetty says, “I’ve noticed that the experts know how to pick the right ones that are just ripe enough to have a hint of sweetness in them.” She shares her experience of relishing them for the first time, “I had the opportunity of enjoying them at a friend’s farm in Mangalore where strategically, bird’s eye chillies are grown right next to the bimbli trees. It was here that he taught me the perfect way to eat bimblis raw — with a mixture of bird's eye chillies and salt. This takes out the extra sourness and replaces it with a spicy taste on the tongue which is absolutely lip smacking.” Spandana who grew up in Udupi, Karnataka has sweet childhood memories of bimblis, “When we were young kids, we used to look forward to our summer vacations so we could pluck the bimblis off the tree in our garden, put them in small boxes, sprinkle some sugar onto them and have ourselves a little picnic.”
Award-winning writer Samin Nosrat of ‘Salt Fat Acid Heat’ fame, goads her readers and viewers to use the acid component of food well, to balance flavour. And this is exactly what bimblis do in food across South East Asia. The bimbli's acidic flavour lends itself very well to curries and lentils. And to pickles and chutneys, which India is famous for. Recently, when the price of tomatoes rose exponentially, the bimbli even began to replace the tomato in Mangalorean curries to maintain pricing. In the western Indian coastal states of Maharashtra, Goa, Karnataka and Kerala, the bimbli is one of the souring agents of choice, locally.
“As someone who researches indigenous ingredients that grow along this little coastline, bimblis have been a delightful discovery and are currently one of my favourite souring agents. It combines the sour flavour profile of a star fruit with citrusy notes of lemon. Add to that its taut, crisp bite and it is the perfect addition to fish curries. I know a lot of people who prefer using it over tamarind,” says Shetty who grew up in Mumbai and moved to Mangalore 5 years ago to learn about and revive age-old Mangalorean recipes that are slowly getting lost. Mangalore-resident Spandana wishes that bimblis were available at local vegetable vendors but this is not the case. She says, “When I was growing up, everyone we knew in Udupi had these trees in their home gardens, now you barely see them. Luckily my mother’s house still has a tree and she uses bimblis instead of tomatoes in dal so I get my share of them.”
Chef Karan Manavalan says, “In Kerala, we refer to bimbli as 'irumban puli'. 'Puli’ quite literally means sour in Malayalam. Just like in Goa, they’re commonly found in peoples’ gardens and backyards in Kerala too.” When asked about his experience with bimblis, he adds, “My personal favourite fish curry with iramban puli is grouper curry. The tartness the bimbli adds to a meaty fish is great. It's generally just split into 2-4 slices depending on the size and added to the curry when it's cooking.”
Health Benefits of Bimbli
As we talk about the tastebud-tingling qualities of bimblis, its health benefits are not to be left behind. Regulating blood sugar levels, controlling hypertension, strengthening bones and curing coughs and colds are some of its magic powers. I should, of course, warn you against consuming its juice, large quantities of which can severely harm the kidneys because of the high amounts of oxalates that the fresh juice contains. Across the countries where this tree is found, its fruit, leaves and flowers are used as remedies for various conditions.
Cooking with Bimbli Outside India
Used raw in a relish in Costa Rica, sun-dried for a seasoning in Indonesia, and cooked with lentils in South India, this versatile, humble fruit, known by many different names across the world, is now finding its way to the menus of chefs world over as gourmet kitchens explore undiscovered flavours.
Considered native of Indonesia and Malaysia, in Indonesia, belimbing wuluh is used to make a sour, fresh vegetable soup as well as a spicy sambal recipe. In Malaysia, this yellow-green crunchy fruit is known as belimbing asam wherein asam means ‘sour’. Malay food blogger, Joyce who blogs under the name ‘Kitchen Flavours’, talks about how rare it is to find this fruit in Kuala Lumpur and other large cities and that you can only get them in the villages.
While being interviewed on “Eat my Globe,” Filipino gourmand Claude Tayag says that sourness or acidity in food is one of the defining qualities of food from the Philippines. This quality can be seen in their popular national dish, the sinigang, which stands for ‘a sour soup’ and is made using bimblis, also known as kamias. Also called pias, the bimblis in the Philippines are a tad sweeter in taste that those in India. In Bangkok, Thai chef Sujira Aom Pongmorn, co-owner of Michelin-star restaurant Saawaan, combines native ingredients that she sources from the Nakhon Pathom province, and heirloom recipes with modern techniques resulting in one of her signature dishes — grilled Iberico pork neck with fermented bimbli (called ta ling pling in Thai).
For me, discovering and growing to love the locally grown foods of a region, is an important part of establishing a relationship with that place. When my Goan cook, Kamal, recently conjured up the most mind-blowing pickle with a handful of bimblis I had brought home from my earlier mentioned friend’s garden, I was introduced to the tart, spicy, tantalising wonder that is bimblanche lonche (bimbli pickle). This is all it took for me to get hooked onto this common Goan household souring agent. With their soft outer coating and their high water content, bimblis don’t have a great shelf life — they’re great for fermenting though. In Goa they are commonly salted and left overnight. By the morning, most of the water has been drawn out. This, in fact, is the first step in the preparation of the common household pickle.
From here I went on to request Kamal to make a sweet and sour bimbli curry, which uses jaggery as a balancing ingredient, that is often cooked in her Saraswat Brahmin mother in law’s kitchen. Eventually our obsession led to us cooking a traditional Goan prawn and bimbli curry. I truly believe that my explorations of this sour fruit have brought me a step closer to belonging to the state of Goa.
Rashi Goel is an independent journalist living in Goa who writes about environmental sustainability, nature, and health and wellness. She blogs about sustainable living on www.greenokplease.com and you can follow her on @rashigoel9.
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