15 fruits you've probably never heard of: Pepino
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hello, I would also like to mention the barbadine fruit from Dominica; the outside is like a papaya but the inside is like a passion fruit. very healthy; in fact soem of the healthiest fruit and vegetables are found there, free from artificial anything.

This article / list would have been better with the botanical names and maybe a link to some mail-order nursery in Hawaii or Florida.

there are stranger fruits out there than mention, there's jujube, kiwi berry,and in the philippines there's aratiles,duhat,mabolo.

This is good news for someone seeking more variety in healthful eats.

some are unknown to me. Others are very common in Malaysia/Singapore. Even u missed some like Jambo Merah, Longan (from Langsat family), Dragon fruit, Passion fruit, one spiky fruit from the north of malaysia which skin is like snake scales (Salak), papaya, chanpedak, and one from Orang asli kampung (like mangosteen but very sour)

I think langsat is called lanzones in the Philippines. They are abundant during the months of September to November.

I am aware of Jackfruit and cherimoya(also called as custard apple) Jackfruit is found in abundance during the monsoon season(June-Sept) in India and it comes from a coastal and mountainous regions of Konkan, near Bombay, India. The fruit is yellow: tastes delicious. In fact, the seeds are edible too. You need to steam them and eat them up. Ymmmmm!!!!
Custard apple or cherimoya tastes like custard, hence the name. White flesh with seeds(the seeds are not edible unlike jackfruit).

There are many fruits the auther has missed like the Star Apple, my favorite when I was a little girl growing up in Vietnam, Kimbujee, can't remember the last time I had any one of these fruits.

almost the fruit can be seen in asian supermarket here in the USA. in the asia there are lot of different fruits and vegetables, not introduce to american. some vegetable are really good in our health.

I live in South American and actually the Pepino is a quite common source of lubrication. Some farmers call it the KY of the south.

Dragonfruit or PITAYA is a lesser-known fruit than the durian or the jackfruit, or cherimoya. It's the fruit of a cactus and is interesting because of numerous seeds, much like that of the kiwi. This fruit and many of those described in this article can be found in Asian stores in California, including Hawaii Supermarket in San Gabriel.

There is a small chain of Mexican ice cream shops in southern California that sell dragonfruit frozen into a delicious sorbet like frozen dessert. The name of the chain is Mateo's and I wouldn't be surprised if other Mexican or gourmet ice cream places might not sell a similar product.

I think the jackfruit you showed was the "marang" because of the finer spines. Jackfruits have coarser and shorter spines than "marang". Those fruits are common in the Philippines.

Look into the details of the spines. Compare it side by side by a picture of a marang you'll get in the internet.

A couple of the fruits shown here are grown in Jamaica and are enjoyed by Jamaicans here in florida.They are also known by different names.

I've actually seen, and tasted, Jackfruit in Africa. It taste a lot better than the description here makes it sound. Tastes a lot like the candy starbursts! And my, they get so big! It's like seeing a tree grow watermelons.


I had both sweetsop and jackfruit trees in my yards when I was living in Asia so I got to agree. the picture of the cherimoya is actually a sweetsop, and the picture of jackfruit is the marang.

Here in Mexico "pepino" is cucumber never heard or seen that one before though

yeah you're right.. pepino in our place is a cucumber..and i love dipping it in vinegar with salt.

I love variety and I love fruit. But if we were to popularize these, what is the price? If we import the fruit - what effect do we make on the local region, plus all the resources used for transportation? If we manage to import & grow the plant here, what effect do we have on native plants and animals? Never an easy answer.

We already import a lot of produce from over seas. Nearly a billion tons of produce come to the US from Chile alone every year. This is a fraction of the total amount of freight that we import, so a marginal increase in agricultural imports will not have a measurable effect on the US's carbon footprint. Also, we already grow plenty of items here that are not native to this land, though most of the listed items in this article are tropical and could only grow in Texas, Florida or Hawaii anyway.

These ALL look good. Wish I could have a chance to try any of 'em

I wish the same too on alien fruit to me till reading this article. I'm from Malaysia and durian/rambutan/mangoteen/langsat/jackfruit are very commonly grown even within our house compound. You should try ciku if you visit Malaysia.

What is ciku? Is it like the chico in the Philippines, which is sapota introduced from tropical America, brown fruit with multiple black seeds. If it is, you'll find them sometimes in a supermarket chain in Southern Florida, although not as smelly as the fruits we have in the Philippines.
Interesting that so many of the fruits on this list seem to be native to rain-forest areas that are being destroyed at such an alarming rate.
























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