SALAK
Salacca zalacca. Family: ARECACEAE Other names include snake fruit.
Snake fruit, also known as salak, is a tropical fruit that is native to Indonesia, but is also grown in other countries in Southeast Asia. It gets its name from the scaly, brown skin that covers the fruit, which resembles a snake's skin. The fruit is small, about the size of a fig, and has a sweet and sour taste with a crunchy texture.
Salak sprouts in clusters off of the base of the palm tree that belongs to the Arecaceae family. It is native to Java and Sumatra in Indonesia, but is also cultivated in other regions of Indonesia as a food crop. The fruit naturalizes in the island of Bali, Lombok, Timor, Maluku, and Sulawesi. Salak is also grown in Thailand, Malaysia, and the Philippines. There are two popular snake fruit plants harvested: Salak sidempuan (Salacca sumatrana Becc.) and Salak pondoh (Salacca zalacca).
There are many varieties of the fruit, throughout Asia, with a few being monoecious. But most of the varieties require both male and female plants.
The flowering process takes three to four years, and the fruit can be harvested for up to 50 years. In Indonesia, the harvest season is in May and December, and the ripening process takes around five to seven months.
Salak’s high levels of dietary fiber in snake fruit can make you feel full, prevent overeating, and improve digestion. The fruit’s beta-carotene, pectin, and potassium levels enhance blood flow to the brain, improving cognition and memory, which also helps lower the risk of degenerative brain diseases.
Snake fruit’s antioxidant beta-carotene can also reduce the risk of progressive cataracts and macular degeneration, improving vision health.
Potassium levels in snake fruit can lower blood pressure, reduce tension in the arteries and other blood vessels, and decrease the strain on the cardiovascular system, improving heart health. Snake fruit has also been traditionally used in native populations of Asia to relieve heartburn.
A potential drawback is that too much salak is known to cause constipation.
A few fun facts about salak:
Salak fruit is oval-shaped and about the size of a fig, with a distinct tip and a reddish-brown scaly skin that is tough and hard to peel. The skin is made up of small, triangular scales that overlap each other, giving the fruit a unique appearance. Inside the skin, there are three lobes (resembling cloves of garlic) that contain a white, juicy flesh with a seed in the center of each lobe.
Salak is a low-calorie fruit that is rich in nutrients. Snake fruit is called the Fruit of Memory in Indonesia because it is rich in potassium and pectin, both important nutrients for brain health and development.
Most snake fruit is eaten fresh but it can also be candied, pickled, juiced, canned, dried, fried into chips, boiled with sugar into a sweet spread, or made into syrup. The fruit is often used in desserts, such as fruit salads, smoothies, pies, and ice creams. It can also be used in savory dishes, such as stir-fries and curries.
One popular way to use salak is to make a jam or preserve. The fruit is cooked with sugar and water until it becomes a thick, sweet spread. This jam can be used as a topping for toast, pancakes, or waffles.
To prepare snake fruit, start by washing it thoroughly under running water. Then, use a sharp knife to cut off the top and bottom of the fruit. Next, make a shallow cut along the length of the fruit and peel off the skin against the grain of the scales. Be careful when peeling the skin, as the fruit has sharp, needle-like spikes that can be prickly. And not just the fruit.... The entire plant is full of very sharp spikes, so harvesting, handling and certainly "contact" with salak should be done with extreme care and with the right protection.
The plant needs a male and a female plant in order to set fruit. This can be a tricky thing, as it takes years to be able to even tell which sex the plant is It is a very short-stemmed palm, with leaves up to 6 metres (20 ft) long; each leaf has a 2-metre long petiole, with spines up to 15 centimetres (5.9 in) long, and numerous leaflets.
