Sunday 6 September 2009

hot jobos cause explosion

I knew it would happen. It was like the day I learned to ride my bike: I cycled over broken glass and it didn't harm my tires, so I turned back and did it again - 2 flat tires and no more bike riding. It was the same with the jobos.

I knew I wasn't supposed to put hot things in my plastic jugged blender, but the day before I had been impatient and had done it anyway without any ill effects. So I reasoned that I could do it again, being careful not to put too many in. But wrong. Within a few seconds the plastic exploded sending shards all over the kitchen, spraying walls and counter tops with hot jobo juice and sending the scalding pits flying everywhere. The blade continued to whir, effectively cleaning out all of the hot sticky mess, until I could reach behind it and yank the plug out the wall.

That was the end of that experiment.

We have three large jobo trees which have been dropping copious quantities of thumb length, fat, yellow brown fruit for weeks now. The jobo is related to the jocote and the june plum, both of which give larger fruits than this smaller cousin, and both of which are sold in markets and by roadsides all around Costa Rica. I like the taste - very apricot like in a sour kind of way, and strongly flavoured. However the pit is large and the fruit fibrous: not so practical for my purpose.

And yet . . . well we have three large trees dropping fruit I'm stepping on as I harvest carambolas. What to do? I'm giving vinegar a go - fill a bucket, cover, shake periodically, strain a month later, bottle for several more months. The fruit is somewhat sweet, it should make vinegar. And jam? Well the taste tells me yes, but scraping that 1/8th inch flesh from round the seed - is a little crazy making, especially when I've got ALL this other fruit piling up in the kitchen. So I thought I'd simmer it a little to soften and extract as much of the juice, then throw it in the blender and strain it.

So now I've had to just stick with the juice - not a lot to work with, but we'll see. If I can make a syrup that would be fine. A long time ago I made sloe gin. I think jobo gin might be quite nice . . .

4 comments:

  1. Sounds like something we call hog plum. Smells delicious but goes to waste cause it has very little flesh and a large seed. Some make wine with it.

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  2. I love reading about all these fruit that I have never heard of before. Sorry you lost your blender though.

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  3. Hi Helen,
    yes, it's a smaller still version of the hog plum - basically the skin is the only flesh. But it smells so good. I think I will try some hobo gin, just have to remember that recipe. Wine would be good too, I always wonder about finding a cool enough place to store it though.

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  4. Daphne,
    and I love reading about all your wonderful temperate crops that I can't do here! Thanks for visiting,
    Ancel

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thanks for sharing!