Basella alba is a perennial vine found in the tropics where it is widely used as a leaf vegetable.

Description

Basella alba is a fast-growing, soft-stemmed vine, reaching 10 m in length. Its thick, semi-succulent, heart-shaped leaves have a mild flavour and mucilaginous texture. The stalk is often purple.

Uses

Food

In Africa, the mucilaginous cooked shoots are most commonly used.

Although it is only distantly related to the vegetable spinach, it is commonly known as Malabar-, Ceylon-, Indian-, East-Indian-, Surinam-, Chinese-, or Vietnamese spinach. It is also known in English as Malabar nightshade or Malabar climbing spinach, broad bologi, poi baagi,calaloo and buffalo spinach. Its Bengali name is pui shak, its Konkani name is valchi bhaji, its Kannada name is basale soppu, and in Telugu it is called bachhali. In Vietnamese, it is called mồng tơi and is cooked with crab meat, luffa and corchorus olitorius to make soup (this soup is popular in Northern Vietnam).

Typical of leaf vegetables, it is high in vitamin A, vitamin C, iron, and calcium. It is low in calories by volume, and high in protein per calorie. The succulent mucilage is a particularly rich source of soluble fiber, thought to remove mucus and toxins from the body. The plant is also a rich source of chlorophyll.

Among many other possibilities, Malabar spinach may be used to thicken soups or stir-fried with garlic and chile peppers.

References

External links

• PROTAbase on Basella alba
• Photo and multilingual synonyms
• University of Florida Agricultural Extension
• Evaluation of tropical leaf vegetables in the Virgin Islands
• Malabar Spinach Basella alba, B. ruba (WorldCrops)