My local produce department is top notch, but nothing beats reaching up and grabbing fresh fruit from a tree. Quanapes, sea grapes, passion fruit, breadfruit, mangoes, coconuts… all were within easy reach during our recent trip to Puerto Rico and Vieques. Landing back in reality includes accepting the seasonality and limited availability of passion fruit here in central Ohio.
Coconuts, on the other hand, have achieved mainstream non-exotic status in US groceries. Grabbing one from a store display seems a bit tame, though, after watching them prepared roadside near El Yunque National Forest. A big knife, a stump and a few heavy swings was all it took to split one open for Matt. A few sips of the watery “milk”, though, and he was ready to move on to the fleshy fruit.
Later in the trip, we watched a man split a coconut with no tools at all, hurling it at the ground repeatedly until it fractured enough to be pried apart. He insisted on giving us the opened coconut and split off pieces of the outer husk to make scooping spoons. Of course, we couldn’t resist trying to split our own then, tossing coconuts at boulders throughout the rest of our trip. They take a bit more effort than peeling a quanape or plucking a sea grape, but the exercise of opening a coconut only adds to the enjoyment of eating one. I bet they taste even better when you climb the tree to grab your own!
Updated from August 23, 2010.
I remember getting a coconut from the local Marsh when I was about 10. Most recently we got one at Kroger … a week or so ago, I think.
Earlier this summer I watched a show in which they had the world’s fastest coconut husker doing his stuff. The man made short work of it. (And… if he wasn’t the World’s Fastest, he was plenty fast enough.)
Fresh food is the best even coconut and seeing how it’s done. Sea grapes now that is something I would like to now what to do with, they are a dime a dozen around here.
Delmer: The next skill I’d like to learn is shimmying up the tree! I remember watching guys harvesting coconuts on St John before they could fall and hit oblivious tourists on the head, ha!
Cate: We just pulled off the fresh sea grapes and ate them off the tree. Red is better! I remember plucking loquats in Bermuda as well after watching locals munching them as they waited for a bus.
No coconuts at Saltfork just cows nearby One sure sign your back in Ohio LOL.. I found to me anyway fresh coconut like you had doesn’t taste like coconut.
Joe Todd: Wasn’t that wandering cow the strangest thing?! I agree as to the taste difference. Fresh coconut isn’t quite as sweet as the more processed fruit we generally have access to. I prefer the fresh stuff though. Could skip the “milk”, but the fruit is pretty tasty!