Flavorful yet strongly pungent, ajwain seeds are one of the popular spices commonly feature in Indian and Middle-Eastern cuisine.
Ajwain seeds are olive green to brown in color, have similar appearance to cumin or caraway seeds with vertical stripes on their outer surface. However, they can be easily distiguished by thier elliptical shape and tiny size.
Some health benefits of Ajwain are as follows:
Ajwain seeds contain health benefiting essential oils such as thymol, a monopterone derivative class of chemical compound, which gives aromatic fragrances to seeds. In addition, they also compose of small amounts other phyto-chemicals such as pinene, cymene, limonene and terpinene.
The active principles in the ajwain may help increase the digestive function of the intestinal tract by facilitating release of gut juices (gastro-intestinal secretions).
Thymol, the essential oil obtained from ajwain has local anaesthetic, anti-bacterial and antifungal properties.
Likewise in caraway, ajwain seeds are rich in fiber, minerals, vitamins, and anti-oxidants.