Pawpaws!
Andy and I have been curious about pawpaws for years. They're large, supposedly delicious native American fruits, and they're supposedly common throughout the Midwest, and yet neither of us had ever seen one, let alone eaten one -- and we have spent a lot of time roaming around out in the woods throughout our lives.
So when we bought this house, one of the first things we did was plant a couple of pawpaw trees, grafted varieties from a specialty nursery. Luckily for us and our shady yard, pawpaws are one of the few fruit trees that produce fairly well in shade. So when those scrawny little sticks we planted finally leafed out, we finally knew what pawpaw trees looked like. Then we looked past the edge of our lawn into the woods, and realized that probably a quarter of the understory trees around our house are pawpaws. Well, that's $40 we could have saved!
So we have been awaiting the ripening of the local pawpaws with great anticipation. Apparently the flowers are fly pollinated and the flies aren't terribly efficient; between that and the various stresses that wild trees endure, the total harvest wasn't huge. We've managed to find something like 16-18 fruits over the past couple weeks. And OMG THEY ARE FANTASTIC.
They have a rich, very sweet, custardy flesh with sort of a banana/melon flavor. I've read that there's a lot of regional variation, and some have more of a mango-like flavor, and some others taste of pineapple. They have a lot more fat and protein than most fruits, so they're almost like a complete meal, nutritionally. (Apparently there were days were the Lewis & Clark expedition ate nothing but pawpaws.)
I know they're fragile and hard to ship, but I still find it surprising that they don't get more commercial attention, because the plants are tough as nails and did I mention the OMG FANTASTIC? I can't believe I can just pick these things from trees just a few steps away from my door.
So when we bought this house, one of the first things we did was plant a couple of pawpaw trees, grafted varieties from a specialty nursery. Luckily for us and our shady yard, pawpaws are one of the few fruit trees that produce fairly well in shade. So when those scrawny little sticks we planted finally leafed out, we finally knew what pawpaw trees looked like. Then we looked past the edge of our lawn into the woods, and realized that probably a quarter of the understory trees around our house are pawpaws. Well, that's $40 we could have saved!
So we have been awaiting the ripening of the local pawpaws with great anticipation. Apparently the flowers are fly pollinated and the flies aren't terribly efficient; between that and the various stresses that wild trees endure, the total harvest wasn't huge. We've managed to find something like 16-18 fruits over the past couple weeks. And OMG THEY ARE FANTASTIC.
They have a rich, very sweet, custardy flesh with sort of a banana/melon flavor. I've read that there's a lot of regional variation, and some have more of a mango-like flavor, and some others taste of pineapple. They have a lot more fat and protein than most fruits, so they're almost like a complete meal, nutritionally. (Apparently there were days were the Lewis & Clark expedition ate nothing but pawpaws.)
I know they're fragile and hard to ship, but I still find it surprising that they don't get more commercial attention, because the plants are tough as nails and did I mention the OMG FANTASTIC? I can't believe I can just pick these things from trees just a few steps away from my door.