i dont understand why passion fruit is not more popular

[lycheeluva]

bought a few pounds of passion fruit back to NY from Robert is Here. I'm in passion fruit heaven. I just cannot understand why it is not more popular. Especially compared to dragon fruit. It is 100 times more flavorful than dragon fruit, 10000 times more fragrant, the flowers are prettier and smell better. sure they can be tart if not properly ripened but thats true of almost any fruit

[FlyingFoxFruits]

passion fruit has to usually wrinkle up, and look awful, before being tasty and sweet.

This works against it's popularity in our markets, being that the uneducated consumer is scared to buy a wrinkled fruit, and also eating the fruit when early and beautiful, can be tart and horrible experience.

These are just two reasons among many, why the passion fruit hasn't gained acceptance.

I have no problem selling them though, and I sell out every time I have them, so I'd say they are popular more so than you may think.

They are often sold as a frozen, pulp, and not a fresh fruit.  We (uninformed American eaters) often eat it as an ingredient, rather than the main dish.

[fruitlovers]

bught a few pounds of passion fruit back to NY from Robert is Here. I'm in passion fruit heaven. I just cannot understand why it is not more popular. Especially compared to dragon fruitIt is 100 times more flavorful than dragon fruit, 10000 times more fragrant, the flowers are prettier and smell better. sure they can be tart if not prooperly ripened but thats true of almost any fruit

I'm with you. We are making lilikoi (passionfruit) everything right now. Every time i drive out i find a few on our driveway from overhanging vines. Here in Hawaii lilikoi is extremely popular and loved by most.. Much used by chefs in their dessert menus. But believe it or not some people don't like them...find them too acid. Then again some people don't like lychees!?!?!?! So that says it all. Just as well or there would be a real shortage if everyone liked them.
Oscar

[NewGen]

I especially like to use them for juice, much like lemon for lemonade. Great flavor.

[fruitlovers]

I especially like to use them for juice, much like lemon for lemonade. Great flavor.

Excellent also in teas, just a little squirt gives any tea a very nice taste. Love the smell, not just the taste! The yellow lilikoi grows wild here along the coast. The purple lilikoi is found growing wild at higher elevations. You can buy 6-7 yellow lilikois for $1 at farmer's market.
Oscar

[HMHausman]

My thoughts......flavor good....not great.....the major objection for me is seeds, seeds and even more seeds.  Very poor flesh to see ratio.  For me, not enough bang for the proverbial buck......tropical flavor notwtihstanding.

Harry

[fruitlovers]

My thoughts......flavor good....not great.....the major objection for me is seeds, seeds and even more seeds.  Very poor flesh to see ratio.  For me, not enough bang for the proverbial buck......tropical flavor notwtihstanding.

Harry

For making many dishes the seeds are filtered through sieve, so not an issue when the plant is producing tons of fruits. If you could taste lilikoi cheesecake i bet you would change your mind. HAHA
Oscar

[Squam256]

What Harry said.

[nullzero]

bought a few pounds of passion fruit back to NY from Robert is Here. I'm in passion fruit heaven. I just cannot understand why it is not more popular. Especially compared to dragon fruit. It is 100 times more flavorful than dragon fruit, 10000 times more fragrant, the flowers are prettier and smell better. sure they can be tart if not properly ripened but thats true of almost any fruit

I think passion fruit is good, but on a lower level then a high brix dragon fruit. The taste, texture, presentation, and edibility of a high brix dragon fruit surpasses passion fruit in my opinion. You must be eating the store carried Dragon Fruits?

[NewGen]

My thoughts......flavor good....not great.....the major objection for me is seeds, seeds and even more seeds.  Very poor flesh to see ratio.  For me, not enough bang for the proverbial buck......tropical flavor notwtihstanding.

Harry

That's why I hate pomegranates. The seeds are numerous (and larger than seeds of passion fruits), and the taste is anywhere from sour to kinda sweet, poor ROI for me. 

[lycheeluva]

Yeh Null- dont believe I have ever tried home grown dragon fruit- just the standard big red things they sell in china town. nice texture, pretty, but completely tasteless. kinda like eating the part of a melon right next to the rind

[lycheeluva]

null if you have access to good home grown dragon fruit and would be willing to sell and ship me a couple, id love to find out what i have been missing

[nullzero]

Yeh Null- dont believe I have ever tried home grown dragon fruit- just the standard big red things they sell in china town. nice texture, pretty, but completely tasteless. kinda like eating the part of a melon right next to the rind

Will try to send you some good fruit, if I get a decent harvest this year. My first experience with Dragon Fruit was from a Vietnamese market.... the fruit was crap (the same that you described). You really should reconsider and try to get your hands on some fresh high Brix fruit. The difference in fruit quality was drastic, the Asian market fruit I had to think about eating it... the home grown I chowed it down looking for more.

[fruitlovers]

bought a few pounds of passion fruit back to NY from Robert is Here. I'm in passion fruit heaven. I just cannot understand why it is not more popular. Especially compared to dragon fruit. It is 100 times more flavorful than dragon fruit, 10000 times more fragrant, the flowers are prettier and smell better. sure they can be tart if not properly ripened but thats true of almost any fruit

I think passion fruit is good, but on a lower level then a high brix dragon fruit. The taste, texture, presentation, and edibility of a high brix dragon fruit surpasses passion fruit in my opinion. You must be eating the store carried Dragon Fruits?

Not a good comparison i think. Dragonfruit is usually eaten out of hand, while passionfruit, at least the P. edulis we are talking about, is usually prepared in some manner, not eaten out of hand. Not too many things you can prepare with dragonfruit. Did have some pretty good dragonfruit wine at one of the CRFG festivals though.
Oscar

[nullzero]

Oscar,

Totally agree all fruits have there advantages or reasons why they are cultivated. Passion fruit excels in preparations and juices. Dragon fruit would do well as a garnish, juices, sorbets, and of course eaten chilled and fresh.

[lycheeluva]

i certainly love passion fruit out of hand, though i appreciate that it probably is taken to the next level when used as an ingredient rather than eating straight. i actually just added one to a yogurt and and it elevated the yogurt to insane levels.

[HMHausman]

You are probably right, Oscar, about the cheesecake.  I guess my idea of a fruit reaching excellent status is somewhat dependent on its being able to be enjoyed out of hand and without too much processing.  Oranges are great out of hand and for juicing, the juice to be used as an enhancer in other things.  Sour Sop (guanabana)...the good ones at least.....great flavor, very poor to eat out of hand.  So maybe I am putting an unnecesary stipulation into the definition of a good eating fruit, but that's the way my brain works.  Raspberries and blackberries also fall into this category.  Love raspberry flavoring/juice or backberry wine or other preparations, but the fruits I would never eat out of hand.  Too many damned seeds.  I guess I just have a sensitivity to it.  I'm the guy that always finds stuff in my food when out at a restaurant.  So far, I have found a staple, wooden skewer, glass, plastic from a shattered container in the kitchen, that pit hiding in the pitted cherry, or that wayward chicken bone in the bonelss breast of chicken always seems to find me.  For me, a fruit with abundant, juicy and nicely textured flesh, like a smooth fiberless mango makes that fruit elevate into super-stardom.  Or maybe I just have a sensitivity that everyone else thinks is silly and I should just get over it, enjoy the taste of the fruit and spit the seeds out or swallow them!

Harry

[fruitlovers]

Oscar,

Totally agree all fruits have there advantages or reasons why they are cultivated. Passion fruit excels in preparations and juices. Dragon fruit would do well as a garnish, juices, sorbets, and of course eaten chilled and fresh.

Dragon fruit is used a lot here by gourmet chefs to make the dish look spectacular with it's vibrant colors. But there are cultivars and species of dragon fruit that are really good tasting, just that the bland ones are the ones mostly grown. There is a purple fleshed dragon fruit from Guatemala that is very tasty (H. guatemalensis). Here we also have some pink and dark red cultivars that are very tasty.
Likewise with passionfruit. Very few people have had any species besides edulis, but there are so many others, including ones that are delicious out of hand like: P. laurifolia, P. ligularis, P. quadrangularis, P. alata, P. maliformis.
If you don't like a certain fruit it's usually because you either have not had a good one, don't know of good ones, or don't know how to prepare it. Except ofcourse for things like noni! 
Oscar

[lycheeluva]

harry, im a swallower!

[Berto]

Passion fruit (maracuja) comes in many varieties.  In Brazil, maracuja is consumed all over the country in many different ways.  Yellow variety - Juices; ice creams; popsicles; pudins; pies; cakes; mixed with sugar cane liquor (batida); cooked with fish; Jellies; Jams.....and many other ways
Purple variety - all the above plus eaten of hand
Maracuja Acu(assu)/maracuja doce (passiflora alata) -  Eaten as a desert fruit - It is sickning sweet
Harri Lorenzi's book has photos of several different varieties.

Besides eating the pulp, you can make flour out of the rind.  In Brazil, you can buy maracuja flour in health food stores - People trying to lose weight mix the flour with food and end up eating less. The flour has lots of natural pectin.
Leaves and flowers are used to make tea.  Maracuja tea is used as a natural sleep aid.  Try  mixing maracuja tea with lemon grass tee.  You may fall asleep before you finish drinking it.

I grow yellow maracuja and maracuja doce (sweet).  I am used to this fantastic fruit.  One of the best fruits in my opinion. Today, I harvested several fruits from my vines...love them!

[TropicalFruitHunters]

I've only had a few passionfruit but the smell was fantastic and the taste was pretty good as well.  The seeds are a turn off.  But wow!  I can only imagine what a passionfruit cheesecake would be like! 

[bsbullie]

Use fresh passion fruit to make a pie similar to a key lime pie.  Use the same ingredients and same ratios, just substitute passion fruit juice for key like juice...you may never make a key lime pie again.

A little off topic but you can also make the same pie using either red limes or calomondins.

[CoPlantNut]

Of the "commonly eaten" passion fruits, I've only tasted edulis and quadrangularis, and both were delicious.  P. foetida fruit was surprisingly tasty- I guess it is the durian of passion fruits, smelling bad on the outside but delicious when tasted.  Fruit the size of a quarter or less makes them impractical to eat, however.  I've also tried P. incarnata, also known as "Maypop", which is the only perennial Passiflora I can get to ripen fruit in the ground outside here in Colorado, but it wasn't really worth eating flavor-wise.

The only passionflower I'm still growing is 'Incense', and strictly as an outdoor perennial.  I've grown and fruited edulis and quadrangularis in containers in the past, but they were always much too eager to strangle and smother nearby plants in my crowded overwintering conditions.  I grew tired of trying to control them for the few fruits per year that they would give me.

   Kevin

[RodneyS]

Have you guys tried "Mission Dolores" passionfruit (Passiflora parritae x antioquiensis)?  I received a rooted cutting last spring and am awaiting flowers/fruits

[brettay]

The other great thing about Passionfruit is how most varieties are quite cold tolerant.  Mine survived 25 degrees with only relatively mild leaf damage.

I completely agree with Passionfruit cheesecake; hands down the best cheesecake I have ever had!

-Brett

[fruitlovers]

You are probably right, Oscar, about the cheesecake.  I guess my idea of a fruit reaching excellent status is somewhat dependent on its being able to be enjoyed out of hand and without too much processing.  Oranges are great out of hand and for juicing, the juice to be used as an enhancer in other things.  Sour Sop (guanabana)...the good ones at least.....great flavor, very poor to eat out of hand.  So maybe I am putting an unnecesary stipulation into the definition of a good eating fruit, but that's the way my brain works.  Raspberries and blackberries also fall into this category.  Love raspberry flavoring/juice or backberry wine or other preparations, but the fruits I would never eat out of hand.  Too many damned seeds.  I guess I just have a sensitivity to it.  I'm the guy that always finds stuff in my food when out at a restaurant.  So far, I have found a staple, wooden skewer, glass, plastic from a shattered container in the kitchen, that pit hiding in the pitted cherry, or that wayward chicken bone in the bonelss breast of chicken always seems to find me.  For me, a fruit with abundant, juicy and nicely textured flesh, like a smooth fiberless mango makes that fruit elevate into super-stardom.  Or maybe I just have a sensitivity that everyone else thinks is silly and I should just get over it, enjoy the taste of the fruit and spit the seeds out or swallow them!

Harry

Hi Harry, i tend to be the same way as you: prefer the fruits that can be eaten straight off the tree or vine, cause i'm usually too lazy to prepare foods that take much time in the kitchen. My wife makes the cheese cakes, not me!  I think everybody has their own preferences and their own quirks, and these even change with the same person as years roll along. If the passionfruit seeds bother you no need to force yourself to eat/spit them, just filter them out with wire mesh. Lots of people don't like mangos because they say they are too messy, fibrous, seed is too large, fruit is too big, peel is too thick, smell weird, taste like turpentine, give me a rash, ok you get the point! 
Oscar

[fruitlovers]

Passion fruit (maracuja) comes in many varieties.  In Brazil, maracuja is consumed all over the country in many different ways.  Yellow variety - Juices; ice creams; popsicles; pudins; pies; cakes; mixed with sugar cane liquor (batida); cooked with fish; Jellies; Jams.....and many other ways
Purple variety - all the above plus eaten of hand
Maracuja Acu(assu)/maracuja doce (passiflora alata) -  Eaten as a desert fruit - It is sickning sweet
Harri Lorenzi's book has photos of several different varieties.

Besides eating the pulp, you can make flour out of the rind.  In Brazil, you can buy maracuja flour in health food stores - People trying to lose weight mix the flour with food and end up eating less. The flour has lots of natural pectin.
Leaves and flowers are used to make tea.  Maracuja tea is used as a natural sleep aid.  Try  mixing maracuja tea with lemon grass tee.  You may fall asleep before you finish drinking it.

I grow yellow maracuja and maracuja doce (sweet).  I am used to this fantastic fruit.  One of the best fruits in my opinion. Today, I harvested several fruits from my vines...love them!

Saw lots of giant yellow passionfruits in boxes at Rio de Janeiro wholesale produce market. Amazing size:

Yes that is regular Passiflora edulis var. flavicarpa. Brazil is a must see for any fruit lover! The people there really appreciate fruits. Practically every place i stayed at served fruits for breakfast and had an amazing assortment to choose from. Get me back to Brazil! (Only down side is their money is worth something and ours isn't, so you won't get much bang for your lousy dollar.)
Oscar

[stressbaby]

LL,
I really like passionfruit, but the reason Jay and I will never grow them is the growth rate and habit.  I grew McCain and another for some time and literally half the time spent in the GH was spent cutting back the beast.  Maybe in a less confined area, but for us it is not worth the work or space.

[North_Tree_Man]

I love passion fruit, and guava for that matter. I eat as many passion fruit and guava based things that I can whenever I visit Hawaii. Also, we drink Guava juice on a regular basis here...not orange juice. I do agree with the seeds being a pain though. I still remember hiking on some trails in Hawaii, and having the fresh scent of guava wafting around the trail from some fallen fruit nearby...heaven!

[sultry_jasmine_nights]

I grow lots of different passiflora not all of them are the edible types but I do have edulis flavicarpa, p. edulis, p. incarnata, p caerulea, p. Incense. The others I have are all ornamental types.  I had the p .phoenicea (Ruby Glow but it didn't set any fruit for some reason, even though I cross pollinated it with everything in the yard)

Here is a pic of the yellow (p. edulis flavocarpa)


p. phoenicea (Ruby Glow) - they sure are pretty

[lycheeluva]

glad to see that among us, its more popular than i had thought.
Robert, thats the same reason I havent grown it- space- but the minut ei get a place in Florida- i'm gonna plant a vew different varieties on every fence and non-fruiting tree.

[Berto]

Oscar,
The maracuja (passion fruit) you showed was developed by Embrapa (Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuaria).  It was developed for the juice industry.  Embrapa keeps coming up with new and improved varieties all the time.  As far as the Real versus Dollar.  I miss the good old days when 1 dollar was worth 3 Reais.  Now 1 dollar is worth approx. 1.7 Reais, and Brazil became very expensive due to its vibrant economy.  A couple year ago, I paid 5 Reais for a large maracuja doce (passiflora alata). It was the size of a small Hawaiian papaya.  Yummy!

[fruitlovers]

Oscar,
The maracuja (passion fruit) you showed was developed by Embrapa (Empresa Brasileira de Pesquisa Agropecuaria).  It was developed for the juice industry.  Embrapa keeps coming up with new and improved varieties all the time.  As far as the Real versus Dollar.  I miss the good old days when 1 dollar was worth 3 Reais.  Now 1 dollar is worth approx. 1.7 Reais, and Brazil became very expensive due to its vibrant economy.  A couple year ago, I paid 5 Reais for a large maracuja doce (passiflora alata). It was the size of a small Hawaiian papaya.  Yummy!

Passiflora alata is a very nice tasting fruit. I wonder, since we are on the wondering topics, why it is not grown more often in USA? Seems like most everyone here grows P. edulis. Brazil right now is about 2x more expensive than other South American countries, due to the high value of their currency. But it's still definitely worth a visit!
Oscar

[TropicalFruitHunters]

Robert is correct.  I had a huge plant and just could not keep up with it.  I have a cousin who swears he has a plant here in town that is killed back each winter but comes back strong in the spring.  Not sure if it would be worth the effort.

[FloridaGreenMan]

Here's a photo of some passion fruits grown by Eric Bronson here in South Florida. These were very nice tasting, just the perfect sweet-tart flavor. I could eat 20 of these in a sitting,  no problem. One disadvantage of these plant (vines) in my area is that they grow so fast and so thick that they can bring down a fence! There is a local attraction called Butterfly World in Coconut Creek that has an incredible passiflora collection, one of the largest in the US.           

[warmwxrules]

When I was in Cancun, I remember the resort I stayed at had them and they were awesome.  No one else seemed to be eating them.