Permission for Persimmons, please
Fuyu
The best thing about the fuyu is that it can be sliced and eaten like an apple or not-quite-ripe pear. You don't need to peel fuyus. My favorite use for fuyus is sliced or diced in salads. Last Thanksgiving, I created a relish with diced fuyu persimmons and pomegranate seeds mixed together.
Hachiya
The hachiya persimmon is more familiar to people, and the trees are also more commonly planted. Hachiya need to be very ripe before using them. [I have not eaten one but other report they are good eating when soft.] Putting them in a bag helps to force ripening.
Hachiya persimmons are very astringent - your mouth will be unusable after taking a bite. Just don't eat them off the tree, like a fuya. Typically, this kind of persimmon is turned into pulp and then used to make a sweet bread or a pudding. I saw a recipe for a persimmon sorbet, which I'll have to try, maybe for the Christmas holidays.
In short, you can't have enough fuyus but you'll easily have too many hachiyas.
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Very lovely photos - and great blog title!
I found a fully ripe hachiya at the store the other day and the cashier tried to talk me out of buying it because it was soft. It was perfect.
would you guys please refrain from posting pictures that are obviously of sunny, warm places? where fruit hangs from trees? In the sunshine? How would you like it if I assaulted you with images of my view of a rainy parking lot? huh?
nothing here but squishy old jack-o-lanterns.
thanks in advance for that.
I just enjoyed delicious rice pudding topped with stewed persimmon...oh, yes, fabulousness.
I first heard of persimmons in the Finnian's Rainbow lyric
Consequently, persimmons have always had a special place in my heart, ever since I realized that, like them, I was queer.Never quite figured out what to do with one, though, so I never bought one. The idea of a sweet bread (NOT a sweetbread!) made with them makes my mouth water. I shall have to look into this.
@#3 posted by olele:
I'm assuming you're comment was aimed at Californians, although I'm not totally sure where Dale is from.
If it makes you feel any better, there was a slight chance of rain today here (in SoCal). So it was a bit cloudy for part of the day, and not totally awesomely sunny all day. ;)
Someone had a bowl of fresh persimmons out on a table at their garage sale yesterday afternoon. I'm now kicking myself for not trying one.
Shaped like a disc,
you can eat it crisp.
Shaped like a torpedo,
eat it soft like Play-Doh. ♥
@#7, I love that rhyme. And if the persimmon tree's rockin', don't come knockin'.
I have a hachiya tree, Dale, and you can dry them before they go soft. They end up being very tasty after drying:
http://www.boingboing.net/2008/10/08/how-i-learned-to-lov.html
Hachiya's lose all their astringency when they are very ripe. Nothing quite like eating one. Most sensual fruit on the planet.
You mean "fuyu", don't you?
I would give my left arm for a ripe one, but I cant find one ready to eat.
When I lived in russia, the sure-fire way to get them soft and juicy is to freeze them. Then, when you thaw them, they are juicy and soft........
What's the deal with the odd fruit focus? Both persimmons and feijoas are abominations of the fruit spectrum, alongside pineapple guavas and loquats. These alternafruits should be scoffed at, not scoffed. Every autumn our dad would try to convince us to eat the season's persimmon crop, at the (his words), "lovely gelatinous stage". We'd gag. The rats loved them though.
Also know as Caqui in Brasil. Here is a picture I took. We just ate them like apples.
We have native persimmons here, small but oh-so-tasty after the frost. Skin is tougher than sh-t too, so harvesting them is a labor of love.
The key is to leave them on the tree until a killing frost, then try to beat the critters to 'em. Before frost, they're horribly astringent and not worth eating.
I believe it's fuyu, not fuya.
I pick a hachiya from my tree when it's translucent and squishy like a water balloon, then pop it open and suck out all the guts. A ripe hachiya is a way, way overripe version of anything else.
Yes, my apologies in calling the Fuyu by another name. It does kind of sound like a karate scream. Fuyu.
I just wrote a fall post on persimmons too! Though in Spain it's a different story. I resorted to an explanatory diagram for clarification.
A friend recommends this recipe for Steamed Persimmon Pudding (that's pudding as in figgy pudding, not as in Jello pudding)...
I'm eating a fuyu right now. That is all.
One of my favorite tongue twisters in Japanese is about persimmons: "Tonari no kyaku wa yoku kaki kuu kyaku da." (The guest next door eats a lot of persimmons.) Doesn't look like much to read it, but try saying it 3 times fast.
"Hachiya persimmons are very astringent - your mouth will be unusable after taking a bite."~ This is true, but then it means that it is wasn't ripe and shouldn't have been eaten yet.
"A ripe hachiya is a way, way overripe version of anything else." ~ This is also very, VERY true.
A perfectly ripened hachiya persimmon is worth waiting for. It will look disgusting and rotten on the outside, but will be totally delicious and awesome on the inside; kinda like brie.
I'm eating Kaki mo... kino katta!
I love Japanese varieties since the ones I got in my garden in Italy can't be eaten till they are super very soft! My ossusume is eating kaki with Williams liqueur. Oishiii!!
Quoted: In short, you can't have enough fuyus but you'll easily have too many hachiyas.
No, not at all. I think of fuyus as instant persimmons, and hachiyas as the adult ones.
Hachiyas need to be ripen almost to the point of disintegration, but the taste----heaven! If you have visited India, there is a really sweet fruit called chiku/sapota---hachiyas are the orange version of that fruit. (On a side note: somehow the only sapotas I have access to in the US---canned from SE Asia doesn't taste good at all.)
I have a hachiya tree in my back yard. It gives a hell of a lot of fruit, so we usually use it to make bread. Hachiya persimmons taste really good as a substitute for pumpkin in recipes (Libby's Great Pumpkin Cookies. Look that up. That shit is delicious).
Birds really like persimmon.
Putting them in a box or bag with an apple works for ripening too.
Back when I was a kid in Oklahoma my grandparents had a Persimmon tree on their farm. We always waited for the first frost to pick them as that stopped the astringency and helped them ripen. They were probably Hachiya since that's what they looked like. You might try keeping them over night in the fridge and see if that helps.
"The hachiya persimmon is more familiar to people, and the trees are also more commonly planted. Hachiya need to be very ripe before using them. [I have not eaten one but other report they are good eating when soft.] Putting them in a bag helps to force ripening."
It's even easier than that. Pick them ripe but hard. Store them in an open basket. Take the darkest one, ripest looking one, pop it in the freezer until frozen hard. Let it thaw to room temperature. Instant, ripened sweet persimmon, no pucker. Repeat until you run out of fruit.
Unripe persimmons are pretty scary:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persimmon#Medical_precaution
I have never seen anyone in Japan eat a persimmon without peeling it first or eat one like an apple.
My chickens go crazy for soft persimmons. I hold one out and they rip gobbets of flesh from it, reminding me of the little T-rexes they are.
I have several American Persimmons on my 7 acres in Tennessee; I've had various types in my travels around the world (Navy, IT Consultant), and I have to say that the American ones are my favorites. get one before it's ripe and you feel like washing your mouth out with honey, but get one a day or so after the first frost and..Manna from Heaven; they are both sweeter and have a more distinct taste than either the Hachiya or the Fuyu; the only one that ever came close are some I got at a street market in Athens (greece, not georgia).
No way they could be marketed, though; the best I can tell there is only about a 2 day window of ripeness; freezing them or drying them just doesn't seem to preserve the distinct taste. I made a small amount of Persimmon liquor this year that does it justice, though. My Aged Mother swears she can make a apple-persimmon preserve that captures it, but she missed out on this years crop.
do they have trouble laying afterwards?
Persimmon bread! I know a couple of folk who can't figure out what to do with their hachiyas: every year I end up with bags of them. Bwhahahaha. I do various things with them (use you own filthy imaginations), mainly I make scads of persimmon bread. The pulp also freezes very well: shock your friends with some persimmony goodness mid-summer.
(Okay, so you can't really specifically taste the damn things in a bread/muffin anyway--but the bread is boocoo moist!)
Unfortunately, I'm allergic to persimmons. I ate a fuyu once, and soon my chest, forearms and thighs were covered with hives. The doctor thought it odd, but not impossible that I would have an allergic reaction from eating them once.
Weird. I was just thinking about persimmon cookies the other day and how I haven't had them since I was a kid. I don't think I've ever eaten one raw.
I was at a Japanese drinking party this weekend (it is labor day in Japan) and we had a delicious kaki-fish-seaweed salad with sweet soy dressing at the beginning. I was informed that the kaki makes you a stronger drinker, or less hung over the next day, or something along those lines. We started around 16:00 and stumbled home right on time at 0:00. Usually the stuff we drink (shochu) gives me AWFUL hangovers, but this time it didn't last much past my first tall glass of water in the morning. Take heed, and eat a kaki before you head to the watering hole.
I just had my first persimmon here in Korea a couple months ago. Since then, I can't get enough! I have had other teachers at my school give me a gift of a branch of organic persimmons. Here, they use them for dye for EVERYTHING. It's a beautiful shade. All hail the persimmon, fruit of the future!
Persimmons are native to the US. Not those particular varieties, but there are some:
http://www.wildmanstevebrill.com/Clippings.folder/America%27s%20Puckery%20Persimmon.html
Meh. You can keep your Diospyros kaki. I'll take Diospyros virginiana over it in a heartbeat. It makes far superior pudding. Ah, pudding of the gods!
/nomnomnom
I have to agree with #35, Postliteracy. The native persimmon has a superior flavor, like an earthy, spicy apricot. It's only ripe when it's squishy soft and most likely fallen from the tree, so you're competing with racoons, deer, fox, possums, etc., for the delicacy. Thanks to a local farmer, I got enough this year for pudding to cap my Thanksgiving meal.
mathelitist @ #24
Instant Persimmons.
What's the title of their first album?
A really ripe hachiya tastes like a candy apple. I waited half my life before I tried one, now I get them wherever I can.
the japanese poet shiki was mad about persimmons too, but very disciplined. he limited his intake to two per 3,000 haiku poems. here's more on that: http://www.worldhaikureview.org/1-2/shikitr4_8_01.shtml
our local grocery store tries to sell the fuyu at $2.50 apiece. a travesty! but i can buy boxes of 30 at my local fruit stand in so cal.
as for anybody with "geography envy" we've got the threat of houses sliding off the hills thanks to recent fires!
"In short, you can't have enough fuyus but you'll easily have too many hachiyas."
I must respectfully disagree. While I've never been fond of the astringent fuyus, I absolutely love overripe hachiyas. They are almost like eating pudding. For a real treat, freeze them and eat them like popsicles.
(Speaking of buying things overripe, my first "exotic" fruit purchase after moving to the Bay Area was a green fig. After I selected it, the farmer at the market asked, "Are you sure you don't want a ripe one?" What the heck did I know? The only figs I'd seen in Illinois were the ones ground up and stuffed into Newtons.)
Ah, memories! I remember trying my first fuyu persimmon while I was stationed in Okinawa in the late 80's. Delicious.
Hachiyas aren't "ripe" or ready for eating until they are totally squishy! Then, they are very sweet and delicious, not astringent at all. I'll never have too many hachiyas!
When it's ripe, it should look like this:
http://mmm-yoso.typepad.com/.shared/image.html?/photos/uncategorized/urasawa305.jpg
The native persimmons in Delaware were ripe months ago; each night the trees were festooned with happy possums and frisky raccoons, and beneath each tree clusters of deer waited patiently for the fallen fruit shaken loose by their quarrels.
The increasingly warm winters here have shown me that persimmons will eventually ripen without a hard frost, but freezing weather definitely speeds up the process.