Kitul – The Healthy Sweetener
The majestic, unarmed palm, straight and strong, crowned with large leaves, stands tall mostly in the evergreen wet zone woods of Sri Lanka. Its multiple uses have given it many names such as solitary fishtail palm, kitul palm, toddy palm, wine palm, sago palm and jaggery palm. Known as Kitul in Sinhala and Konda Panna in Tamil this palm tree has a high medicinal and cultural value to Sri Lankans as a nation best known for hospitality which is often marked by offering sweet Kitul jaggery with a cup of tea, coffee or any other herbal brew to any visitor. As far as the fishtail palm is concerned making the sweet treacle is quite a laborious process though its fruit freely offers a terribly irritating itchy substance.
Next to coconut palm, probably Kitul is the most useful tree for the island nation. Kitul is not endemic to Sri Lanka, nevertheless, its traditional applications are unique to Sri Lankan culture. Kitul timber has often been a metaphor of strength in Sinhalese literature while the long flower is compared to ladies’ hair. Sweet Treacle and jaggery made of Kitul, with its low sugar content, have been the traditional sweetener for Sri Lankan traditional oil cakes which had many uses in the past. In addition, Kitul jaggery is, undoubtedly, the best sweetener for a cup of tea and curd served with Kitul treacle is a mouth watering dessert.
Common to some tropical Asian countries including India, Myanmar and Nepal, Fishtail palm (Caryota urens ) has 27 species found across tropical Asia to the Malay archipelago, Australia, and New Guinea. The name Caryota urens means a tree with irritatingly itchy nuts . A tall, solitary trunked , kitul tree grows to a height around 20 m and diameter of about 50 cm. It has a sparse crown of very large bipinnate leaves, often 2-3 meters long and 1-2 meters wide. The leaves are dark green, and shiny. The fishtail-like shape of the outward-turned long leaflets give the palm its English name. It takes around 15 years to start flowering . Flowers appear from the upper leafaxils and bloom successively downward to the main stem. The inflorescence is a stalk around 4 m long . When the last bloom appears above the main trunk and produces fruits, the palm dies.
The earliest historic references about Fishtail palm dates back to 2nd Century B.C. when it was an industry. In ancient Ceylon Kithul products such as treacle and jaggery were commodities that were used in the barter system for other foods such as paddy, pulses, vegetables and meat. Due to its medicinal properties, it is said, Dutch rulers prohibited tapping Kitul and alternatively introduced sugar in a move to weaken the unbeatable Sinhalese forces. According to one reference milk rice and Kitul jaggery was the food given to people severely wounded after torture during Kandian era. Kevums (Traditional oil cake) were taken to battlefield as a preserved energetic food and means of treating wounds. A Porridge made from kitul flour is used to treat gastric ulcers, migraine headaches, snake-bite poisoning and rheumatic swellings. The root is used for tooth ailments, the bark and seed to treat boils.
Hard wood of Kitul is mainly used for making pestles and rafters. It is also used for making excellent tool handles and plows. Leaves are used for roof thatching. The nearly one meter long black bristle fibers from the Kitul leaf base produce better quality string and brooms than does coconut coir . Kitul fibers are used in Sri Lanka today and in the past were exported to England for brushes. In the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, strands of 5-6 fibers twisted together were a valued substitute for whalebone in women’s corsets. The heart of the kitul palm can be processed to kitul flour, a starch which mixed with kitul syrup makes locally esteemed porridge and sweetmeats. The processing is rather laborious but is commonly undertaken for festival days. Kitul products have medicinal properties including a low glycemic index and are used in treatments in the ayurvedic medical system practiced in Sri Lanka. Uses include applying root bark and the “cabbage” or terminal bud of the palm to treat rheumatic swellings and snake bite. The cabbage is also employed for gastric ulcers. Treatments for boils call for kitul bark and seed. The root is used for tooth ailments. A variety of religious rituals incorporate kitul treacle.
Kitul converts starch reserves to large quantities of sugary phloem to fuel the growth of the stem apex or inflorescence. This sap or “sweet toddy” is tapped through the flower and then boiled down to produce syrup and raw sugar. Unlike some other sugar palms, kitul is not easy to tap. The process of tapping the sensitive kitul flower and maintaining the flow of sweet sap requires skill and experience. A specialized occupational caste of tappers has emerged as a traditional cottage industry of sugar and alcohol producers in Sri Lanka. The traditional Sri Lankans knowledge on tapping Kitul flowers is amazing and unique. With their techniques, once an inflorescence is tapped, the sap is obtained continuously for a considerable period. In certain cases, sap had been obtained for 8-10 months from inflorescences with a yield of about 20-30 bottles per day per inflorescence.
Ediripitiya is a village in the boarder of Sinharaja virgin forest off Deniyaya. Most of the villagers there make a living with tapping Kitul for treacle. Jayantha is an experienced Kitul tapper who says he taps each and every inflorescence to make kitul jaggery. ”If the middle trunk is fat yield is high. First of all we remove leaves have to cut the tip of the inflorescence, remove outer covers and keep till it turn greenish. Then certain herbal mix including chilies and pepper is kept in the inflorescence making a long groove, and wrap it with clothes or skin of some tree. Finally root of the flower is burnt. Thereafter it is ready for tapping. ”
Labor has been divided between men and women in the household Kitul industry such that men climb palms and tap flowers and women process the sweet toddy to syrup. Every morning and evening the fresh toddy is brought home from the palms and handed over to the women. The fresh toddy is sweet, but in the course of a few hours it begins to ferment and becomes cloudy, going completely sour in 24 hours. Processing the toddy into syrup pre-empts this fermentation. Alternatively, when alcoholic beverages are the desired end product, the nectar may be allowed to ferment to the mildly alcoholic “toddy” or be further distilled.
Alternatively, the syrup may be further boiled down to create “jaggery,” or crystallized palm sugar. In this case, once the syrup stage is reached, the fire is reduced to a low flame and the syrup is stirred every five minutes or so. Once it approaches the desired viscosity, the syrup is pulled off the fire and continuously stirred. As it cools, the syrup thickens and is finally poured into molds for hardening. The traditional mold is a coconut half-shell, called a hakuru essa in Sinhalese. Two halves make a ‘hakuru mula’. Scrapings from the pot can be rolled into small balls for home consumption. Champa , a lady from Ediripitiya, says jaggery is kept in the attic over the fire place in the kitchen to preserve and get its characteristic smell.
If not boiled into syrup or sugar within a day, sweet toddy ferments into a mildly alcoholic, beer-like beverage also known as toddy. This toddy is always drunk in the evening of the same day it was tapped. Additional left over toddy, by this time fermenting rapidly, is sometimes crudely distilled into a much higher proof alcohol known as Ra.
Kitul being one of the best natural sweeteners with low GI ,suitable for diabetic patients , Rancrisp Cashew has introduced an exclusive product – cashew coated with Kitul treacle. Cashew, the kidney like small seed rich in unsaturated fats, nutrients, fiber and plant proteins but low in sugar, together with Kitul treacle, yet another low sugar sweetener makes a mouthwatering healthy food.
