Never heard the lyrics parsed that way before…
try lov-ed.
i do like persimmons, a coworker had one last week. i was very envious.
Those things are amazing.
Having a persimmon tree in our yard as a child taught me their true purpose: whipping them at passing cars.
They’re called kakhi-fruit over here. I had one years ago and found it totally meh. I think I will try again!
I have a great huge persimmon tree in my yard. Since this was a working farm since the early 1800’s I’d assume it is a palatable kind. Farm folk don’t leave useless trees in the center of a garden. All I know is when they drop they get all squishy and the honeybees really like them.
StG
Here’s what friend Marcel did and it’s worked for me;
Set on counter with stem side up,
Cut in half down through stem,
Pare out stem halves with flick of knife,
Peel skin w/ knife and quarter flesh to eat.
I don’t think the skin is peelable like an orange, it’s more like an unripe tomato.
I tried this last night (see the influence the Straight Dope has on my life?).
I was underwhelmed - they have a very similar consistency to a very firm tomato - which i don’t really like the consistency of…
But they were okay and would be very good in a salad.
The Guinea Pig REALLY likes them.
Sorry. I really get the sense from replies though that the variety and ripeness of the fruit has a huge bearing on taste. My one complaint is that the fruit isn’t bigger.
What Gesturing Mildly said and I would add that it probably reminds me most of a date.
Yes, ripeness is very important. Grandma made some pudding this year with underripe fruit, and it wasn’t nearly as good.
I found that I have a few versions of her recipe. It’s always good, but I’ve never made it myself, so I can’t say which one is which. Here is one of them.
2 cups persimmon pulp
2 cups sugar
2 beaten eggs
1 t. baking soda
1 1/2 cups buttermilk
pinch of salt
1/2 t. cinnamon
1 t. vanilla extract
1/4 cup heavy cream
1/2 stick butter - melted
1 1/2 cup flour
1 t. baking powder
Beat pulp, sugar and eggs until blended. Add baking soda to buttermilk and stir up. Mix into pulp, then add in the rest of the ingredients and mix well. Pour into buttered 13x9 pan and bake for 45 minutes at 325, or until it’s set, like an old-fashioned pudding. It will likely rise up when baking, and then fall.
A lot of people serve this with whipped cream, but I always have it with cold milk poured over it.
Bueno, thanks! It did take calling 4 stores before I could find one that will have some in tomorrow. Must be just a bit late in the season or there are a lot of people doing some holiday cooking with them. That’s what we’re planning, my daughter and I are going to cook this together. If it’s as good as it looks, and I’m sure it will be, we’ll make that collaboration the start of a new holiday tradition.
See my initial post. I can never decide if the finished product looks like cat food or dog poop, but suffice to say, it’s not appetizing. I’m happy that I started eating it so young, or else I probably never would have started.
Mangosteens are the fruit of the gods. I live in Bangkok right now and I eat a ton of the things. I foresee tears when I have to leave here and move back, because you can’t get them in the US, as far as I know.
ETA: they’re really not that much effort to eat, and kinda fun. Much less labor-intensive than lychees, longans, or rambutan, and less gooshy than mangoes. You can actually tell how many segments are inside the fruit by how many “petals” are on the bottom-- it’s a fun party trick to wow new mangosteen eaters with!
It depends on where you are. I’ve definitely seen them in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Okay, now I’ve got to get persimmons and see if they bring bliss to my life, too.
Mangosteens may be a bit more work, though.
Mangosteens are really good–on the outside they look kinda like plums but with a tough rind. Inside, they’re sectioned like oranges, but the sections have a sort of soft-fuzzy-peachskin texture.
They’re very, VERY juicy (again, think citrus) and the flavor is interesting. Remember the kid’s candy “SweeTarts”? The flavor is less tart and less sweet, but vaguely like that–sort of a “mixed fruit” or “tutti-fruiti” type flavor.
It’s not…quite blissful. But it’s pretty damned close.
Several things:
- I found mine in an local Asian market. They came in a 1 lb bag for about $17.00
- At least 3 or 4 of mine were moldy inside. Be careful.
- They go really well with aged gouda cheese. I mean really, REALLY well.
Okay, a report on my first ever desert baking; Persimmon Pudding.
I found a store that had a dozen Fuyu persimmons displaying various stages of ripeness. Unsure which was appropriate I bought ten across the spectrum, from a firm, shiny orangish hue to a soft and dull reddishness and while peeling them tasted each to see which had the better flavor. Without question what I preferred were the firmer persimmons that didn’t yet have any of the darker splotches on their skin or soft texture that comes with increasing ripeness.
Generally I think if you’re pureeing them you can expect two persimmons to yield one cup. I peeled all ten since I wanted to judge all ripeness vs flavor and then adjusted Gesturing Mildly’s recipe (thanks again!) up accordingly. I also melded it slightly with this one, adding ginger, nutmeg and water in an additional pan and cooked it a bit longer.
The results blew my wife away, that being the taste and not that the kitchen didn’t explode. It did rise and then fall and we poured heavy cream on top and it was quite wonderful. It almost reminded us of a warm pumpkin pie, something I wouldn’t have expected, but that may be because of the added spices.
I must add though that my favorite thing about persimmons is the delicate, unusual sweetness of the fruit and that if processed it can easily be compromised or overwhelmed by competing flavors. Not that that’s a bad thing, just first understand the flavor really is very delicate. It makes an awesome pudding but the real treat in my mind is to find one just ripe enough and enjoy it raw, which makes it not unlike a number of other fruits.
Sincere thanks for everyone’s input. I hope to someday have Elysian’s woods or a farm like St. Germain’s.
Now, off to find one of those mangosteens.
Glad you liked it. I’ll expect the Fed-ex guy to arrive any moment with my serving.
Right?