Confounding canistel. You are super sweet, starchy, and sticky with egg-yolk-orange flesh (hence your nickname egg fruit). Most cooks use you in desserts, but you know I’m a savory gal. And though it sounds easy enough to substitute you for sweet potato and pumpkin, I can’t use you until you turn to near mush. What is an Occaional Omnivore to do?
Alas, I used my first ripe canistel in a batch of gnocchi that were infused with Meyer lemon and tossed with butter, sage and pancetta. While the gnocchi were tasty, their texture was a bit gummy. And only the sweetness and color of the canistel stood out. Otherwise the fruit was invisible. The verdict: I wouldn’t use the recipe again, so I won’t share it with you here.
The star of the meal was sweet kale cooked simply with olive oil, garlic and chicken stock. The match-up pitted familiar vegetable, easy preparation and stellar results vs. exotic fruit, involved preparation and acceptable results.
With two more ripe canistel in my fruit bowl and three more in the box this week, I won’t admit defeat. Yet.
{ 5 comments… read them below or add one }
Yum. I finally used the last of my canistel last night in a sweet rice pudding. I had the same clumps, but I was lazy and ignored them.
I made curried “pumpkin” soup with the canistel, using unroasted canistel, which promptly clotted up into meat-like clumps when it hit the heat. However, the blender took care of the texture, and a healthy quantity of lowfat sour cream took care of the sweetness (wish I’d had nonfat Greek yogurt instead). It came out very well, except I should have stayed away from garam masala and used more curry powder.
Hi Caroline, I tried doing the pasta thing with canistel last year. I stuffed a mixture into home made ravioli and it was too sweet for me, however I did NOT try roasting them as Bill suggests. All three of us are still striving to use this tricky fruit in savory dishes.
I tried another savory recipe (before you commented) without roasting, but I’ll definitely roast the last two fruit. Do you just toss the canistel in olive oil and pop it in the oven?
For savory recipes, roast your canistels first. It cuts the sweetness and firms them up which makes them much easier to deal with. It’s not a normal preparation, but I promise it will work.