In traditional Ayurvedic medicine, it has been used for centuries as a memory enhancer, nootropic, antistress, anxiolytic, antidepressant, anticonvulsant, tranquilizing and sedative agent.
In Southeast Asia the flowers are used to colour food. In Malay cooking, an aqueous extract is used to colour glutinous rice. In Thailand, a syrupy blue drink is made called nam dok anchan, it is sometimes consumed with a drop of lime juice to increase acidity and turn the juice into pink-purple. In Burmese and Thai cuisine the flowers are also dipped in batter and fried.
Other Details
Very easy to grow from seeds from pods that dried and browned on the plants. Commonly grown as hedge plant.The flowers are a beautiful blue and the foilage is a consistent gorgeous medium to dark green. Tolerant of a wide range of soils and including alkaline soils. In very hot climates 45C, 113F it appreciates some shade from the afternoon sun. Grows and expands very fast
This is one of my favourites. Thanks for creating an entry in the Flora database. I had already created an entry for the same plant in July but yours is far better in terms of details. Can the moderators delete mine and keep this one or perhaps even merge them.
On the other hand, the Urdu name Neelofer, in a strict sense, is reserved for the blue water lily (which is indeed very beautiful too) :-)
Please continue adding entries. I was busy the last so could not add new plants.
Thx Farooq. I m sorry I should have checked before posting this. I thought I am the first one posting about this vine, as I never came across any discussion on this vine on the forum. The vine was blooming in my garden so i could not stop my self.. You may like to merge any additional information from this post into your post, as you posted about this vine first. You can edit your post, admin not required.
Okay..no problem you can always check the index which Farhan has made. We are slightly short of 200 entries...those who were adding entries are apparently naraaz from us ... I am more inclined to delete mine because your pictures are excellent and refreshing (after merging some info).
