Tasting the Tropics at Naples Botanical Garden

Tis the season for tropical fruits in South Florida. We have a perfect growing season for tropical fruits and many of us have at least two or three tropical fruits growing in the backyard. The most common backyard grown tropical fruits are pineapples, bananas, avocados, mangos and depending on your cultural tradition, you might add star fruits, carambolas and even a jackfruit.

For most of us, it is a trial and error; a friend of a friend gifted you a potted mango, a dwarf banana, a papaya or avocado and you planted it in the backyard hoping for the best. To your surprise, you are now the owner of a neighborhood edible tropical fruit collection.

On Saturday I visited the Tasting the Tropics at the Naples Botanical Garden, a popular Saturday event with lots of families and children at the tasting table. According to one of the volunteers, these are not your “average backyard” tropical fruits. 

It is fun growing tropical fruits with their characteristic bright colors, aromas and taste but this Saturday, there was a smorgasbord of exotic and not so common tropical fruits for public tasting. The collection was more expansive than your grocery store variety. It beckoned you to touch and smell and the exterior gave no clue as to its taste. These are the fruits that caught my attention:

I thought I knew mangos but nothing prepared me for the over 30 varieties of mangos on display that are grown here in South Florida. The Lancetilla Mango is a three-to-five-pound mango that was introduced at the 2001 International Mango Festival at Fairchild Tropical Botanical Gardens. Homeowners can grow this mango easily as it can be pruned to just ten feet tall. The large fruit is blood red, sweet and fiberless and ripens from August to September when most mangos have been picked. Unfortunately, they did not have one to sample and I would have taken home a plant for my backyard.

Pura Vida Avocado is also called the long neck avocado. I was told that Pura Vida is creamy and slightly sweet - can you imagine the guacamole you can make from one avocado? It looked a bit “un-avocado-ish” averaging 18 inches long and sometimes even longer. They are being sold at fruit stands in South Florida.

Sapodilla goes by many names and is grown in India, Africa and the Philippines. They’ve been called chikoo, sapote, or chiku. 

Carambola – or Star Fruit – has also been referred to as the “five angled fruit” or Star Apple. It is a very common backyard tropical fruit in Marco and a very versatile addition to salads. I prefer to eat the tart fruit raw with a light sprinkle of salt.

Hog Plums are bright yellow, ping-pong ball size fruits and can be eaten both raw or cooked but the best use is for jams and jellies. Hog plums are an important food for birds and wildlife.

Soursop is also called a custard apple, guyabano or Brazilian paw. It has a greenish-yellow color and prickly skin that you break open to taste the creamy white fruit. The taste is a cross between a strawberry and an apple with a tinge of citrus.

A Wampee looks like a lychee or longan and was told it was every bit as tasty. But I was cautious and not wanting to be disappointed, I put the fruit down.

Like most of the visitors to the Tasting the Tropics event, we all took a taste bud trip across the tropics to sample unfamiliar fruits.

A big thanks to volunteers from the Collier Fruit Growers who were very helpful providing information on the various tropical fruits. The CFG is dedicated to informing, educating and advising as to the propagation of many varieties of fruits that can be grown in Collier County.