2024 Author: Gavin MacAdam | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 13:38
Guarana (lat. Paullinia cupana) - a bright evergreen representative of the Sapindovy family, which looks like a climbing liana. In Brazil, this plant has long been a cult.
Description
Guarana is a liana plant that can grow up to twelve meters in length. The serrated leaves of this culture are characterized by an oval shape, and bright red flowers are collected in bizarre bunches. This spectacular beauty begins to bear fruit only in the third year of her wonderful life.
Guarana fruits are about the size of a hazelnut and are covered with very thin peels, which can vary in color from gray to yellowish. As soon as the fruits begin to ripen, all the peels burst, exposing black or purple-brownish seeds. Such interesting transformations give guarana a very original and unusual look - its fruits take on a resemblance to human eyes.
Where grows
The homeland of guarana is sunny Paraguay (more precisely, the territory of the Amazon basin) and distant Brazil. Sometimes you can find guarana plantings in Peru, as well as in Colombia and Venezuela. In any of these countries, this crop has been actively cultivated for several centuries.
Application
The main value of guarana fruits is that they contain twice as much caffeine as coffee. This allows them to be used as an excellent stimulant. And the plant itself needs such a high concentration of this substance in order to actively resist pathogenic microbes.
Raw guarana fruits are not used - they are used to make a paste, which serves as a valuable source of caffeine. This paste is widely used for preparing coffee drinks and as an additive in chocolate. And the fruits freed from the peels are often fried and immediately ground into a fine-crystalline powder.
Guarana is rich not only in caffeine - it contains some other stimulating substances (and pacemakers too). Such valuable properties made it possible from time immemorial to use it as a doping for local tribes - Guarana helped them especially well during long and long migrations. It was also appreciated for its ability to relieve headaches and relieve fever or severe constipation. Guarana is also famous for its antispasmodic, powerful antipyretic, as well as bactericidal, strengthening and tonic properties. In addition, she is also a great aphrodisiac.
To dull feelings of fatigue and severe hunger, relieve hangovers, arthritis or diarrhea - all on the shoulder of the miraculous guarana. Drinks based on it help to activate thinking and strengthen memory, and as a dietary supplement, guarana will bring many benefits to active athletes. And it will always help reduce appetite and thereby contribute to weight loss, as well as improve bowel function and lower the level of bad cholesterol.
The high content of caffeine in guarana gives it a very valuable ability to remove excess fluid from the body, which in turn helps to quickly say goodbye to edema and significantly reduce the burden on the kidneys and heart. True, at the same time, one cannot discount the fact that caffeine leaches calcium from the bones and actively interferes with its full assimilation. So when using valuable fruits, it will not hurt to observe the measure, otherwise you can significantly increase the risk of getting arthritis, osteoporosis or caries as an unpleasant "bonus". In addition, excessive absorption of guarana can lead to increased nervous excitability and insomnia. With extreme caution, guarana should be used by hypertensive patients, the elderly, as well as by all those suffering from heart ailments and atherosclerosis. And nursing and pregnant women should not turn to her for help at all!
