As an after-food mouth freshener, paan is a common treat in many Indian households. Its made of 3 main ingredients: areca nut, betel leave, and lime powder. A red-brownish paste called kaththa, as well as a number of flavorful spices, seeds or even tobacco, can be added. The betel leaf used to make paan has not only traditional uses but also health benefits.

Chewing a paan or betel leaf after meal is an ancient food tradition in India. People, post their meals, usually make their way to nearby paan shops to eat paan, while some make them at home. Chewing paan is normally consume after festive occasions to refresh the mouth and digest.

Nutrition value of Paan Leaves

Paan known as nutrition dish that has a lot of vitamins and minerals useful on your health. According to sources, these are nutritional fact of paan serving Size 1 Paan (7g):

• Carbs 20g
• Dietary Fiber 0g
• Sugar 4g
• Fat 1g
• Saturated 0g
• Polyunsaturated 0g
• Monounsaturated 0g
• Trans 0g
• Protein 0g
• Sodium 1mg
• Potassium 20mg
• Cholesterol 0mg
• Vitamin A 0%
• Vitamin C 2%
• Calcium 1%
• Iron 1%

Percentages are based on a diet of 2000 calories a day.

Health Benefits of Chewing Paan and Betel Leaves Nobody Told You

Betel leaves contain healthy compounds which not only freshen your breath, but also cure a lot of health problem. These are benefits of chewing paan or betel leaves that you might not know before:

1. Aid the digestion of food

Indigestion is a common problem in urban living. It makes us feel full even when we haven’t eaten anything. Chewing paan leads to the formation of saliva juices which are essential for digestion. It stimulates the release of saliva, which is the first step of digestion, as various enzymes in it break down food, making it easy-to-digest.

2. Reduce cough and congestion

Chewing betel leaves will help to soathe a sore throat from a cold and infection. Soaked betel leave in mustard oil, warmed and applied on the chest to relieve congestion in the lung. Or you can simply add honey on betel leaf juice to make you warm and get rid of wet cough. The essential oil in this leaf has an important role in this properties.

3. Prevent carcinogen that lead to cancer

Betel leaves exhibits antioxidant, antimutagenic, and anticancer properties. Betel leaves helps maintain the levels of ascorbic acid in the saliva, by chewing it.

4. Heals wounds

Betel leaf is a classic remedy for wounds. It contains polyphenols that have antioxidant properties. They boost the activity of the free radical-scavenging enzymes in your body, like superoxide dismutase and catalase. Just applied over a wound and bandage, it can heal a wound and accelerate the healing process. You can also place a leaf and wrap it within bandage to help the healing process.

5. Cures headache

Betel leaves has cooling properties which provide instant relief from the ache when applied externally. Chew betel leaves and its cooling and analgesic would keep nervous system health and protect you from headache.

6. Diabetic friendly

People are believed that component in the betel leave would reduced the blood sugar level, that prevent from diabetes. It has tannins as active molecules that have antidiabetic properties.

7. Fat burning

If you want to loss weight effectively, maybe betel leave would be your better option. It reduced body fat and increases the metabolic rate of the body. Take one betel leaf and add 5 pepper corns to it, fold it up and chew on this. Have on it on your empty stomach for 8 weeks, and you can burn your fat effectively.

8. Anti bacterial and fungal

Betel leaves are rich in polyphenols offering dual protection from gems. It’s also has amazing anti-fungal properties provide instant relief from fungal infection. It used extensively in treating arthritis and orchitis. In indonesia, women use this to clean the genitals after giving birth as it cleansing and anti-inflammatory. Applying juice of betel leaves kills fungal infection on the specific area.

Going back to roots, paan was originated due to its digestive properties. Those who felt heavy and bloated post any meal and had severe constipation issues consumed this age-old mouth freshener. Betel leaves are nutrient packed with riboflavin, calcium, vitamin C and carotene. However, maintain a gap of at least 30 minutes between paan and your meal.

Chewing paan may has harmful effect, but most of the risks are associated with the consumption of the areca nut and tobacco. Paan can be consumed on special occasions, but frequent, prolonged use should be avoided.