What is useful for coconut milk and what to cook from it

Five reasons why this product should take place in your refrigerator, and three simple recipes with coconut milk.

Coconut milk is an underestimated product in our latitudes. He is known mainly as an element of exotic Thai cuisine and a number of diets, suggesting the abandonment of one or another food of animal origin. In this case, coconut milk is an alternative to the usual cow or goat milk, cream or sour cream.

However, a delicate creamy drink with a light sweet taste has much more useful properties, rather than just the opportunity to substitute sour-milk products. Lifehaker found out all about the health benefits of coconut milk.

Than useful coconut milk

First, let's define the concepts. Coconut milk is not the same water that splashes inside a whole tropical nut. That liquid is called coconut water, consists of water itself of almost 95% and practically does not contain fat or other nutrients.

Milk is a carefully processed to a homogeneous mass of coconut pulp and water. Lifkhaker already wrote how you can make coconut milk yourself.

At the output is a high-calorie product with a high content of polyunsaturated fatty acids, vitamins and trace elements. So, after drinking one cup (240 ml), you will get Coconut Milk Health Benefits and Uses:

552 kilocalories;

57 g of fat;

5 g of proteins;

11% of daily intake of vitamin C;

22% of the daily norm of iron and magnesium;

18% daily potassium;

21% of the daily norm of selenium.

In addition, completely override the daily requirement of the body in manganese. But what makes this fatty-vitamin-mineral cocktail with your health.

1. You lose weight

For many, the word "fat" causes a stable association with excess weight, but in this case, fats, on the contrary, contribute to weight loss. Sounds absurd? No.

Coconut milk contains mainly polyunsaturated fats (including the famous irreplaceable omega-3, omega-6 and omega-9), which are very useful for metabolism. But that's not all. About half of all fatty acids are lauric acid. This substance belongs to the category of so-called fatty acids with an average chain size, which have one unique feature: from the digestive tract they go straight to the liver, where they are immediately used to produce energy or ketones (these substances are the main "fuel" for the brain).

Therefore, coconut fat has much less chance of becoming fat reserves - the body consumes it almost instantly. The Properties of Lauric Acid and Their Significance in Coconut Oil.

In addition, lauric acid has another bonus: it participates in the brain receptors controlling appetite, and helps to reduce the feeling of hunger. Here, for example, a small study showed that overweight people who consumed fatty acids at breakfast with an average chain size at breakfast ate 272 kcal less than during lunch Those who used at breakfast fat of a different kind.

2. You are smarter and more productive

This is how the already mentioned polyunsaturated fats omega-3, omega-6 and omega-9 work, as well as lauric acid, the energy supplier for the brain.

3. You increase the immunity

Lauric acid is also a powerful antimicrobial Fatty Acids and Derivatives as Antimicrobial Agents and an antiviral that reduces the number of bacteria and viruses in the mouth and in the body as a whole. There are confirmed data that lauric acid is able to resist even such active and dangerous viruses as HIV, measles and a number of herpes, including cytomegalovirus.

4. You strengthen the health of the heart and cardiovascular system

Coconut milk reduces the risk of cholesterol plaques on the walls of blood vessels. Moreover, this effect is so noticeable that scientists talk about good prospects for using coconut milk in dietary nutrition of cardiac patients.

For example, in this 8-week study of the effect of a diet supplement with coconut milk and soya milk on the lipid profile in normal free living subjects, conducted with the participation of 60 men, it was found that the use of oatmeal in coconut milk reduced the amount of "bad" cholesterol in the blood and increased the level of "good".

5. You improve the condition of the skin and hair

Coconut milk has a beneficial effect on our body, not only inside, but also externally: for example, how fatty acids omega-3 and omega-6 that enter the diet affect the skin's hydration level, the Lifehacker already wrote.

Antimicrobial and antiviral activity of lauric acid also extends to the treatment and prevention of all kinds of skin diseases: from eczema to herpes. Milk can be used as a mask for hair and skin or added to the usual cosmetic products - for example, nourishing body cream.

Here is a video in which the famous American nutritionist Bruce Fyfe, president of the Coconut Research Center in Colorado Springs (USA), talks about how the fats in coconut milk affect the appearance.

Thanks to the addition of coconut milk, the taste of the traditional milkshake becomes deeper and more interesting, acquiring an exotic note. If for some reason you do not consume traditional dairy products (say, because lactose intolerance), cow's milk in this cocktail can be completely replaced with coconut or water.

Ingredients:

400 ml of coconut milk;

200 ml of cow's milk;

80 g of brown sugar;

200 g fresh strawberries;

20 g of coconut chips;

ice cubes at will.

Preparation

Wash strawberries, peel off the tails, putting aside 3-4 berries (by the number of glasses) for decoration. Put the peeled berries in a blender. Add ice, based on the desired temperature of the future cocktail.

Then pour the coconut and plain milk, whisk until homogeneous. Add the sugar and whisk again.

Pour out on high glasses, sprinkle with coconut shavings. Goblets decorate whole or cut on a plate of strawberries with preserved tails.