Bilimbi (Averrhoa bilimbi L.)

Bilimbi plant (Averrhoa bilimbi L.) is a kind of small trees that are thought to originate from the Maluku Islands (Indonesia), but from other sources also said to come from tropical America. Plants are usually planted in the yard to be picked fruit. The fruit has a sour taste are often used as syrup freshener, flavoring dishes, clean the stain on the cloth, polish goods made of brass, clean hands are dirty or as ingredients of traditional medicine.

This plant with an annual age can reach 5-10 m high with a trunk that is not so big and has a diameter of only about 30 cm. Planted as fruit trees, sometimes grows wild and is found from the lowlands to 500 m above sea level. Bilimbi have rough bumpy stem, short and have few branches. Leaves odd pinnate compound leaf form, alternating, 30-60 cm long and grouped at the end of the branch. On each leaf there are 11 to 45 pairs of oval leaves.

The flowers are small, emerging directly from the stems with hairy flower stalk. Crown of five flowers, white, yellow or lilac.

Ellipse-shaped fruit up to like a torpedo, 4-10cm long. Color when young green fruit, with the remaining petals attached at the ends. If the ripe fruit is yellow or pale yellow. Flesh juicy fruit with a very sour taste to sweet. Shiny and thin rind. Seeds small, flat, and brown, and covered with mucus.

These plants have chemical properties with a sour taste and cool, in addition to pharmacological effects include: analgesic, multiply the expenditure of bile, anti-inflammatory, shed the urine, astringent. This plant contains saponins, tannins, glucoside, calcium oxalate, formic acid, sulfur, peroxide, and potassium citrate.

The plant is used for the treatment of disease is flowers, leaves and fruit. Bilimbi interest to treat coughs and stomatitis. The leaves of this plant parotitis and efficacious cure rheumatism. While men can treat whooping cough, bleeding gums, canker sores, painful cavities, acne, phlegm, hypertension, paralysis, improves digestive function, and inflammation of the rectum.