Plant atlas Short
Water Mimosa: Thailand's Crunchy Floating Green
Water Mimosa · ผักกระเฉด · Neptunia oleracea
Water Mimosa — ผักกระเฉด (phak-kra-chet) — Neptunia oleracea.
Snap a stem and you find it sheathed in spongy white sleeves of air — the floats that keep this vegetable riding on the surface of a Thai pond. On the plate they stay crisp and squeak against your teeth. The young shoots and leaves carry calcium, vitamin A, vitamin C, iron, and fiber. The parts you eat are the tender shoot tips, the floated stems, and the young leaves.
Water mimosa is prized for one thing — that crisp, squeaky snap against your teeth, stir-fried with garlic and chili or dropped into a sour soup. One caveat: it floats and soaks up whatever is in its water, including heavy metals, so buy it from clean-water growers and rinse it well.
Pad Phak Krachet — ผัดผักกระเฉด (pad-pak-kra-chet)
Gaeng Som Phak Krachet — แกงส้มผักกระเฉด (gaeng-som-phak-kra-chet)
Source: Zakaria et al. (2019). Antioxidant and alpha-glucosidase-inhibitory phenolics in Neptunia oleracea (in vitro). BMC Complement Altern Med. PMID 30616569, DOI:10.1186/s12906-018-2413-4. Arsenic root-vs-shoot accumulation in water: Plants (Basel) 2020, PMC7694506.
Educational content, not medical advice! Consult your doctor before changing diet or medication.
#LongevityBiome #ThaiHerbs #WaterMimosa
Food and nutrients
Rich in: calcium, Vitamin A, Vitamin C, iron, fiber
Research context
Water mimosa's antioxidant and alpha-glucosidase activity was measured on leaf extracts in a lab dish; the shoots you eat are a calcium-rich pond green — BMC Complement Altern Med, 2019