To your health…

I blogged about my aloe vera plants the other day and somebody asked me if I ate them or not. Well, I did try and make a drink with it once and my girl said it was quite tasteless and besides, I thought it was rather tedious getting the gel out of the leaves for the purpose.

I know of a couple of places where they have the drinks on their menu and I also heard of a lady selling it by the bottles at the Dewan Suarah wet market but I have never tried any of those.

Anyway, since I have a lot, and I have read of a lot of health benefits that one can derive from the drinks and according to this website, it’s not just physical benefits that you can reap by drinking aloe vera juice, but mental benefits as well. Aloe vera is an adaptogen, meaning it helps the body adapt to stress. Incorporating it into your diet can balance your mood, calm your nerves, and reduce your overall stress levels. That was why I decided to make my own, other than placing them all over the house as air purifiers.

To do that, I took the leaf…

…cut it into shorter lengths…

…before slicing off the thorny edges…

…and then I removed the green part, front and back…

…to get the gel inside. It may not be that easy as it is slimy and slippery.

Lastly I cut the gel into thin strips and rinse it again and again to get rid of the slime…

The first time around, I boiled some red dates and wolfberries with some pandan leaves in water and then I added the aloe vera and some sugar. It tasted nice but it reminded me of the Chinese cooling sweet potato soup/dessert so the second time I decided to use some lemon instead.

I boiled the lemon juice and slices of the fruit with some pandan leaves, adding a bit of sugar to counter the sourish taste…

…before adding the aloe vera and it turned out all right…

…but something was not quite there – maybe it was the pandan leaves and it tasted different with the not-all-that-compatible fragrance and taste…

Because of the aforementioned, I did not add any pandan leaves when I made the drink again but using orange juice (Sunkist) instead and my girl loved it! I know one place where they have the aloe vera drink with mulberry but my plant, though it is growing well, has not been bearing fruits for a while now. I wonder why…