Category Archives: Food

Miracle Fruit Taste Tripping

As part of the tropical fruit video series we’ve been doing, I decided miracle fruit should be next on the docket. We have three small trees and recently two of them started fruiting!

Miracle fruit
Miracle fruit berries growing on the tree

Miracle fruit (Synsepalum dulcificum) is a little different from most of the other fruits of the tropics because the fruit itself is not really so much a food as a food enhancer or transformer. It makes nearly anything sour taste sweet after eating just one berry! The effect on the taste buds lasts a little less than an hour depending on the person.

When Britton and I first tried it, we were amazed and astounded that foods like lemons and limes tasted like lemon merengue and limeade. So we brought a couple of berries to a party and everyone who tried it was also wowed by the powers of this fruit. We did learn that not everything sour should be changed however! At the party wine changed to a flat Dr. Pepper taste and Medalla tasted watered down. The reactions people had to this amazing fruit gave me the idea to get a few friends together to try miracle fruit for themselves. This video is the result. Not only does the video demonstrate the magic of miracle fruit, but it also showcases some of the wonderful and adventurous people who live in/near Rincon. Enjoy.

 

What do you think of this post?
  • WOW (3)
  • Awesome (8)
  • Interesting (5)
  • Useful (0)
  • Bummer (0)
  • Whoa (0)

Start of Summer in our PR Yard

It’s that time of year again. Early May when the whole town of Rincón seems to clear out. The seasonal folks go back to the (mostly) Northeast of the US, and even people who live here permanently start planning summer vacations. That leaves us die-hards with the whole place to ourselves!  Even the most popular beaches are completely empty! The weather can start to get a little hotter, but at our place under the cool shade of the mango tree, we still have to put on a light blanket at night.

Baby mangoes
Mango flowers and fruitlets

The other transition is in all the plants. Everything comes alive in the summer. The avocados are beginning to form again and mangoes have been dropping like crazy hitting our cabana roof.

The robles (tabebuia) have bloomed a couple of times. They have these dainty trumpeted purple flowers that the hummingbirds and bees love and when they are finished they slowly spiral to the ground and form a flower petal carpet.

Purple roble flowers
Pink/purple robles

We also have lots of different food growing. We recently saw that our Surinam Cherries were fruiting. These are interesting little fruits that are in the shape of a pumpkin. Sweet but also tart with a distinct, hard-to-describe flavor. Britton and I munched on a bunch of them though.

Surnam cherries
Surinam cherry AKA pitanga

And we were super excited to see one of our pineapple plants forming a pineapple! We have had some difficulties in growing citrus as well as pineapple. The citrus has all sorts of diseases here in Puerto Rico, and it seems that pineapple often succumbs to root rot. This one, however, is doing great!

Pineapple forming
Pineapple growing

What do you think of this post?
  • WOW (0)
  • Awesome (4)
  • Interesting (2)
  • Useful (0)
  • Bummer (0)
  • Whoa (0)

Tamarind

Bowl of tamarind
Tamarind from a tree out back

One of our new favorite snacks is tamarind or tamarindo in Spanish!

We really had never seen or eaten tamarind before, but wow, what a treat! It’s like candy growing right off the tree. It tastes a bit like a chewy sweet tart candy. You just pull the fruit off the tree, crack it open and suck the jelly off the seeds. You can also make juices, candies or sauces with the pulp. I prefer to just eat it straight from the tree.

It is currently in season here in Puerto Rico and we have two or three big trees right here on the property. We are always amazed by the wide variety of tropical fruit here, but even more so we are amazed that these great fruits aren’t more common in the stores in Puerto Rico! So many things can be grown here (and are!) but they just don’t make it through the “normal” distribution chains. You’ll see things like this tamarind from Thailand sometimes before you’ll see the local Puerto Rican variety! It’s crazy!

Tamarind Walmart
Tamarind all the way from Thailand in a Puerto Rican Wal-Mart!

That’s why we get a lot of our Puerto Rican produce at the little fruit stands or just grow it ourselves. We made a short little video that shows how to identify both the tree and the fruit and how to tell if it is ripe or not. Enjoy!

What do you think of this post?
  • WOW (1)
  • Awesome (8)
  • Interesting (1)
  • Useful (2)
  • Bummer (0)
  • Whoa (0)

Fiesta del Acabe del Café en Maricao

This weekend was the 37th Annual Fiesta del Acabe del Café or the Festival of the Coffee ‘End’ (Harvest) in Maricao, PR and our friends Ben and Missy invited us to go with them there on Sunday.

Bienvenidos

Britton and I have been to quite a few festivals around the island, but this one was by far the biggest. There were lots of venders of all sorts, live music and nice people.

Coffee lady
One of the coffee vender displays

There was also lots and lot of Puerto Rican coffee. We love the coffee here. In the mountainous areas where it is slightly cooler like in Maricao, coffee grows extremely well and with a great flavor. You won’t see Starbucks any time soon here! This stuff is the real, local deal!

Coffee berries
Coffee berries in various states of ripeness

We walked around and checked out most of the booths and had a little of the carnival style food and drink.

With friends at coffee fest
Enjoying some chicken pinchos and fresh-squeezed Maricao orange juice with our friends

Coffee plants
An agricultural display showing various coffee varieties

As we were walking around we even stopped to enjoy an impromptu group of drummers, singing and swaying to the beats. It was pretty cool.

What do you think of this post?
  • WOW (0)
  • Awesome (6)
  • Interesting (1)
  • Useful (0)
  • Bummer (0)
  • Whoa (0)