Okra

This is an aromatic bean native to the West Indies, where it is known as Gumbo. It is now grown extensively in India, West Africa and the Southern States of America, and to a lesser extent in the South of France. The young green pods are sometimes pickled and the older pods preserved in cans for export. Okra has a peculiar flavour, often thought disagreeable to an unaccustomed palate. It is exceedingly mucilaginous, the pods in the tin being surrounded by a substance of greater viscidity than gum.