The Surinam cherry used to be a common hedge industrial plant in Florida , often just called “ cherry hedging . ”
When I was a kid , our neighbors had a cerise hedge across the front of their porch and we would occasionally corrode the weird , tarry fruits . They had a strange mouthful , almost like you licked a battery while eating an artificially flavored dulcet working girl . If they were n’t to the full right , they were fearsome . When they were amply good , they were edible but still had an undertone of spar varnish .
AsGreen Deane writes :
“ I will freely accept these little red-faced pumpkins are an acquire taste . Most folk are expecting some kind of cherry taste and they do n’t have that . No matter how ripe , there is a resinous quality . To be free-spoken , you either like them or you definitely do not . More so , they must be blame when utterly advanced or they are a very unpleasant edible experience . What is absolutely ripe ? There is orangish ruby-red , the people of color of cars , and here is blue red , the coloring of old - prison term fire trucks and blood . Surinam cherries are edible when they are a deep blood - ruby . Let me repeat that : A mysterious line of descent - reddish . An orange violent one wo n’t harm you but you ’ll wish you had n’t corrode it . And I do it you will campaign the envelope and hear one that is not rich , downcast - stock red . Do n’t find fault me . I warned you . You wo n’t choke or throw up or the like but your mouth will disown you and the next time you will pick a very ripe one . ”
So why do I say Surinam cherry red are an “ first-class fruit ? ”
Because an improved Surinam cherry multifariousness has as much in common with its unwashed hedging - abode relative as a good , sunlight - warmed Honeycrisp apple has with a wormy crab orchard apple tree .
I used to think the good varieties of Surinam cherries were the disastrous one . you may see a shot of some develop in this picture , starting at 0:39 :
The black varieties are much better than their usual red counterparts , asJulia Morton wrote :
“ There are 2 distinct case : the common bright - red and the rarer dark - crimson to about black , which run to be sweeter and less resiny . ”
The fundamental word is “ tend , ” as I have now discovered a very good violent variety and am circulate it from seed . This special red Surinam cherry has a big fruit with a lot of bod and a small pit . The resin flavor is a scope spice to the fruit , rather than a dominant savour , and they savor honest even when not amply ripe . I ’m going to attempt to air - layer the smorgasbord ( I share details and illustration on air - layering in my bookFree Plants for Everyone ) to exactly duplicate it , as I ’m not sure it will grow rightful to typewrite from seed . I do know that seeds from black kind will develop into black diversity , but I do n’t know how well yield timbre is transmit from genesis to generation .
Sometimes we give up on fruits too easily . opine if the men of ancientness had decided not to bother propagating citrus after taste wild sour oranges ! Seeking out good variety and propagating them is a great affair . Because the mutual form of Surinam cerise are , at good , an “ acquired taste , ” it does n’t stand for all of them are . The black kind I try on at the Broward County Rare Fruit and Vegetable Council were delectable right from the Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree , as was the violent diversity I tasted here . I saved seeds from both and have them grow on my porch , before long to be planted into my new tropical food woods .
I ’m planting the seeds . If you find a peachy yield , do the same !
