Home › The Guava › Semi-Tropical Fruits

Semi-Tropical Fruits

THE HE mango (Mangifera Indica) is one of the most delicious and one of the most maligned of tropical fruits, this state of affairs arising because of the unpleasant fibrous nature of several varieties and the unmistakable turpentine flavour of some of them which have unfortunately been put upon the market stringy and unripe. The best mangoes are almost as delicate as perfect pineapples and contain much food value. Not only is this fruit susceptible of being cooked in numerous ways and eaten fresh, made into wine and various preserves, but starch and glucose are manufactured from the mango and when animals of the lower world are given it as a staple food they flourish. The fruit is truly exceedingly juicy and it is sometimes said that it should be eaten only in one's bathtub, in consequence, but where the mango grows in the greatest luxuriance and it is properly understood and used one may procure the regular mango-fork, a three pronged affair of which the middle prong is long and projecting, to be so imbedded that the fruit will not slip. Otherwise, the mango may be sliced before serving with wine, sugar and nutmeg. It may also be simply stewed. Before maturity it may be pickled or preserved, as well as at later stages. The kernels of the seeds are sometimes roasted and eaten like chestnuts.

The Tropical Papaw (Carica papaya) is a very interesting and valuable tree as well as fruit. The form of the tree is more nearly that of a palm than anything else and the leaves resemble those of both the castor bean and fig, being curiously cut, large and graceful. They have a singular and valuable power in their action upon meat fibre in which quality the rind of the papaw shares: When the rind is rubbed over the toughest meat or the meat is wrapped for a few hours in the leaves the offending toughness entirely disappears. The fruit juice has remarkable stomachic qualities and Joseph Jefferson was a noted example of the claim that the tropical papaw is a cure for dyspepsia. In form the fruit is rather a cross between the banana and the muskmelon. It may be prepared for cookery, like the coarser vegetables of northern climates, before it quite reaches maturity; eaten uncooked, it must be thoroughly ripened to be acceptable to the palate. (This fruit is not in the least related to the Northern papaw.) "Prickly Pear" is rather an indefinite term as there are over one hundred and fifty members of this, the Opuntia, of the Cactacea. The yellow-fruited O. Ficus-Indica and the O. tuna, which bears purple-red fruit, are perhaps best known and are very commonly used for eating uncooked or stewed with some other fruit, as lemon or pineapple, for flavouring, or preserves. The fruit, though sub-acid, has with many varieties not distinct enough a tone to render it extremely popular though it is very refreshing and cooling and the mucilaginous quality, which is not unpleasant, is considered healing. The purple-fruited prickly pear is often used for colouring in desserts and preserves.

The Granadilla and "May-Pop" are members of the Passifloraceæ, edible fruits of the passion vine. The Maypop, Passiflora incarnata, grows wild in the Southern States, but it is little known that it makes a beautiful and delicate jelly. It is a smaller edition of the Passiflora edulis and the Passiflora quadrangularis, two varieties of granadilla,