18.3 Stone fruit and tropical fruit

Stone fruit

Stone fruits, also called drupes, are apricots, cherries, nectarines, peaches and plums. Each has a thin skin, soft flesh and a single hard, woody stone, or pit. Most came first from China and now grow in temperate climates everywhere.

Stone fruits bruise easily, travel badly and do not keep long. Do not wash them until you are ready to use them, because damp makes them spoil. They dry very well and are made into liqueurs and brandies.

• Apricots are small and round, with velvety skin from deep yellow to bright orange around a dark, almond-shaped pit. Eat them raw, or poach, stew, bake or candy them. They suit compotes, savory sauces for meat and poultry, quick breads and tarts, and they purée well for sauces, jams, custards and mousses. Choose plump, firm, well-shaped fruit, never greenish-yellow or mushy. They last several days in the refrigerator but taste best at room temperature. Canned apricots are usually a fair stand-in. Dried apricots and apricot juice, called nectar, are easy to find.
• Sweet cherries are round or shaped like a heart, roughly 1 inch (2.5 cm) wide, with skin from yellow to almost black. The dark red Bing is the favorite; Royal Ann and Rainier, which are yellow-red, are found in some places. Sweet cherries are sold fresh, turned into maraschino cherries, or candied for baked goods. Cherries do not ripen after picking. Choose firm, plump cherries with green stems and no brown spots near the stem; a dry or brown stem means the cherry is not fresh. Once the stem comes off, the cherry spoils fast. Refrigerate them, and wash them only when you are about to use them.
• Sour cherries, such as Montmorency and Morello, are light to dark red and so sharp they are seldom eaten raw. Most are canned, frozen, or cooked with sugar and a starch such as cornstarch or tapioca to make pie filling. Sweet and sour cherries are both sold dried.
• Peaches and nectarines are one fruit with two skins: a peach is fuzzy, a nectarine smooth. Inside, both are sweet and juicy, white to pale orange, and one can usually replace the other in a recipe. Use them raw or in tarts and pastries, jams, chutneys, preserves and savory relishes; they suit Asian and Indian dishes well. The skin can be eaten, but peaches are usually peeled, and they peel easily after a quick blanch.
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• Plums are round to oval, anywhere from tiny up to 3 inches (7.5 cm) wide, with a thin skin that may be green, red, yellow or blue-purple. Eat them raw, bake or poach them, or put them in pies, cobblers, tarts, jams, salads and compotes. Choose plump, smooth, unmarked fruit that gives to gentle pressure, though green and yellow kinds stay firm. Avoid damp brown spots near the stem. Plums can ripen at room temperature and then go into the refrigerator.

Peaches and nectarines come in two types. In a freestone, the flesh comes away from the pit easily, so these are the ones for eating raw. In a clingstone, the flesh holds tight to the pit; clingstones hold together better in cooking, and most canned peaches and nectarines are clingstones.

To choose peaches and nectarines, smell them and look at the color: you want a good aroma, an overall cream, yellow or yellow-orange color, and smooth skin with no marks. Red patches do not mean ripeness. A green skin means the fruit was picked too early and never will ripen. After picking, peaches and nectarines get softer, but no sweeter.

Tropical fruit

Tropical fruits come from hot tropical and subtropical lands, and fast shipping now makes most of them easy to find in the United States. All of them can be eaten raw. Their flavors suit one another and suit rich or spicy dishes of meat, fish and poultry.

Bananas are in fact the berries of a big tropical herb. They grow in bunches called hands. A common yellow banana measures between 7 and 9 inches (17.5 and 22.5 cm), with soft, sweet, sticky flesh inside a skin you do not eat. Baby bananas, 4 to 5 inches (10 to 12.5 cm) long with yellow or red skin, are denser and sweeter, and their small size suits many desserts.

Bananas are always picked green, because letting them yellow on the plant spoils their texture and flavor. A green banana is hard, dry and starchy, but it ripens after picking, so buying green is fine if there is time. Let bananas ripen at room temperature. A ripe one is yellow with brown flecks and no green at the tip. As it ages, the peel darkens and the starch turns to sugar, so it gets sweeter. Avoid big brown bruises and a gray tinge, which is a sign of cold damage. Eat ripe bananas raw or in salads; save bruised or over-ripe ones for breads and muffins. Cherry, cinnamon, ginger, honey and chocolate all go well with banana.

Plantains, or cooking bananas, are bigger and less sweet than common bananas. Tropical cooks often treat them as a starchy vegetable.

Dates grow on the date palm. Each is between 1 and 2 inches (2.5 and 5 cm) in length, golden to dark brown, with a paper-thin skin and one grooved seed. A date looks dried but is a fresh fruit, sticky-sweet and almost candied. Dates add flavor and moisture to breads, muffins, cookies and tarts, and can be stuffed with meat or cheese to serve as an appetizer. Choose plump, glossy, moist dates. They are sold pitted (whole, chopped or pressed for baking) or whole with the pit, and date juice is used as a sweetener.

Kiwis, or Chinese gooseberries, are roughly as big as a large egg. They have thin, fuzzy brown skin and bright green flesh around a white core ringed with tiny black seeds. They are sweet but a little bland. Use them raw: peeled and eaten, sliced into salads, or as a garnish. Heat makes them fall apart, so they are not for cooking, but they suit glazed fruit tarts and can be puréed for sorbets, sauces and mousses.

Mangoes are oval or kidney-shaped and weigh 6 ounces to 1 pound (180 to 500 g). The thin, tough skin is yellow to orange-red, patched with other colors, and the green fades as the fruit ripens. The juicy orange flesh clings to a big, flat pit. The flavor is sweet and spicy with a sour edge. Purée mango for drinks and sauces, or slice or cube it for salads, pickles, chutneys and desserts; it goes well with curry and barbecued meat. Choose firm, well-colored fruit with no marks. A ripe mango smells good and is neither too soft nor shriveled. Ripen it fully at room temperature; after that it keeps a week at most in the refrigerator.

Papayas look like large greenish-yellow pears and weigh 1 to 2 pounds (500 to 1000 g). Cut in half, a papaya looks like a melon, with golden to pinkish flesh and a middle full of round, silver-black seeds. The seeds can be eaten; they are peppery and a little crunchy, and they can garnish fruit salads or flavor salsas and compotes. Ripe papaya is good raw with just a squeeze of lemon or lime, or puréed for sauces, cold soups and sorbets. Green papaya goes into pickles and chutneys, or is baked or stewed with meat or poultry. To judge ripeness, look at color more than softness: the more yellow and the less green, the riper. Hold papayas at room temperature until fully ripe, then refrigerate up to 1 week.

Passion fruits are about the size and shape of a large hen's egg, with a hard purple shell around orange-yellow pulp and large black seeds you can eat. The flavor is sweet, rich and citrus-like, and the pulp goes into custards, sauces and ice creams. Choose heavy fruit with a dark, wrinkled skin and a strong smell; ripen at room temperature if needed, then refrigerate. Bottled or frozen purée gives a strong, true flavor.

Pineapples are covered in rough brown "eyes" that make them look like a pinecone. The pale yellow flesh is sweet and very juicy around a woody core, which can be eaten but is too tough for most uses. Most weigh about 2 pounds (1 kg). Eat pineapple raw, or bake or grill slices to serve with pork or ham; Southeast Asian cooks use it in curries, soups and stews. A pineapple does not ripen after it is picked, so it must stay on the plant until fully ripe, and then it spoils fast. Choose heavy fruit with a strong, sweet smell and rich color, without dry leaves or soft spots, and use it as soon as you can.

Fruit enzymes, gelatin and meat

Enzyme tenderizers for meat, and how gelatin sets, are covered in earlier chapters. see chapter 9: Ways to tenderize see chapter 7: Gelatin, agar and pectin