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| Diospyros texana |
Texas Persimmon, Diospyros
texana
Eat
the black ripe fruit raw or use the pulp in wine, breads, pies, jams,
sauces and puddings. Be sure to get all the pulp off around the seeds, but
don’t eat them!
Some places in South, West and
Central Texas are blessed with Texas persimmon thickets so productive that one
can pick gallons full of ripe fruit off of one tree in mid-summer. Eating a
perfectly ripe Texas persimmon is as wonderful as indulging in a berry patch.
In Texas’ version of Eden, Eve probably would have been tempted by this
luscious fruit. Then again, the risk of encountering poison ivy or a snake is
low since the persimmons are usually and conveniently picked right around eye
level – just be sure you have your boots on.
Texas persimmons are slow-growing,
multi-trunked trees with a semi-evergreen habit. Their light grey bark is
smooth and sloughs off in large flakes as the tree ages. When the tree has
received moisture at the right times during the year, the black-colored ripe
persimmons can be as large as golf balls though they are more commonly the size
of large marbles. Either
way, their taste is something like a prune, but less tart and more sugary
making it one of the best tasting wild fruits in Texas.
Ripe persimmons will look plump,
round and smooth and can easily be pulled from their limbs. Squeeze the inner
pulp out of the skin and into your mouth for a lovely treat on a hot summer
afternoon. Once you’ve sucked all the pulpy sweetness off the seeds, spit them
out and eat another. You’ll need to indulge in several to feel full. Then, pick
as many as you can for your recipes. When you arrive back in your kitchen, wash
and dry them – they will store in the refrigerator for a couple of days or
freeze them for several months. Most recipes using persimmons will call for
persimmon pulp - about 4 cups of Texas persimmons will make 1 cup of pulp.
Since Texas persimmons are small, you’ll want to make every effort at pulping
count. After you’ve removed the stem end or calyx, use a cone sieve or food mill
for best results and employ a rubber spatula to scrape the sides every once in
awhile. Once you’ve collected as much pulp as possible, there will still be
quite a bit of pulp stuck to the seeds and the sides of your sieve. Run a
rubber spatula down the sides of the sieve, and then clean the seeds off in
your mouth to get that final bit of goodness. You can also throw the entire
pulpy fruit blob in a saucepan, add some water and make it into persimmon juice
for jelly.
