Living in the tropics as I do, passionfruit flavored/infused/juice drinks are everywhere. I tried passionfruit once and loved the tartness of it. I have also tried Tamarind flavored things, and liked them, too.
 |
| PASSIONFRUIT! |
Yesterday morning, at the market, I finally remembered to try buying some passionfruit and tamarind, as I've wanted to. Now, I had never eaten fresh tamarind. I don't know if anyone ever does, but I thought I'd try a passionfruit-tamarind juice. Since I like them both.
 |
| Pods about 4-5" long, meat inside is sticky and pulpy. |
I bought the fruit, then came home and looked up recipes. I did not immediately find anything combining the two fruits, possibly because - get this - they are BOTH known for being sour! haha. Joke's on me.
Both basic juice recipes call for a blender, and sweetener. We do not keep sweeteners at home, because ants are everywhere all the time, and I don't want to mess with the hassle of keeping them out of liquids, or trying to keep sugar crystals dry. I keep my life as simple as possible.
Without a blender, I did the best I could to collect the meat of each fruit. Tamarind is tricky, because it's pulpy. I really think I need to invest in a blender if I want to use tamarind again. But you know what? Unsweetened was perfect for me! I gave Brett a half-glass to taste, too. He didn't mind it, but commented that the passionfruit seeds are better than the juice itself. True. It's like pomegranate that way. He didn't drink any more, leaving me to basically drink 4 passionfruits. (I didn't take any pictures, sadly.)
Then, when I sat down at my computer, I looked up the nutrition of passionfruit, just for fun. It's fruit, so I figured it's healthy. I found out obvious things: high in antioxidants, protects against cancer, boosts the immune system. Blah, blah, typical tropical fruit things, right? Further down, I read that a small percentage of people have an allergic reaction. Okay, no problem, I'm not prone to allergies.
Next sentence:
"Those with a latex allergy appear to be most at risk of a passion fruit allergy."
Guess who has an allergy to latex? Oops. My darling husband, whom I just poisoned. I sent him a quick message, so he'd be alert if his body acted weird. He said he already had a headache, on a day when he had just been talking about how GREAT he felt.
I'm a horrible wife.
Luckily, it was a mild headache. But it was there.
ReplyDeleteAnother point for doughnuts!
Sadly, you can't find decent doughnuts here.
DeleteOops. Well, now you know.
ReplyDeleteMaybe I know, maybe not. I offered him a passion fruit the other day, TOTALLY forgetting what happened. I love those sour things. SO YUM!
DeleteAnd knowing is half the battle!
ReplyDeleteOn the bright side it is interesting to learn that tamarind is pulpy. It looks so much like a peanut (and is in the legume family) that it seems like a weird thing to have pulp.
Pulpy and fibrous. It's the weirdest thing to handle. They recommend soaking the pulp in warm water to soften it so you can separate the seeds from the pulp.
DeleteGet this: The seeds are SQUARE!