There are enough people that have a fundamentally different opinion on what a good persimmon actually is that i decided to start a topic on it. Many people absolutely love kaki persimmons and i simply do not. They are tolerable to me but not desirable. American persimmons on the other hand like early golden i find very delicious. Nikitas gift and others i find to be very much like an american persimmon. What are your opinions about your favorites? In many parts of the world kaki is king and leaves those people asking the question what is an american persimmon? Who's Growing Improved American Persimmons? Suggestions welcome!
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Only being halfway contrarian when i say that my vote goes to the Texas Persimmon.
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I can’t recall ever eating a Texas persimmon Diospyros texana - Wikipedia .Glad to hear they are delicious. " It is known in Spanish as chapote , chapote manzano , or chapote prieto ,[2] all of which are derived from the Nahuatl word tzapotl ." I bring this up because most people dont know chapote or sapote is actually referring to persimmons.
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It’s pretty delicious. About as seedy as a small Virginiana, but with a plum flavor with a little bit of a syrupy molasses brown sugar flavor.
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In my observations, the folks who enjoy D. kaki in the crisp stage do not care for subacid flavors. They generally prefer chiquita bananas and fuji apples over a flavorful peach.
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Can you post a picture of your favorite, Jerry?
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I do not care for the Fuyu and Hatchiya I have tried either. I wish I could try an American persimmon.
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It is often a matter of what you grew up eating. Fuyu types are picked early and eaten crisp in a mild barely sweet stage in their native region.
Personally I didn’t eat my first persimmon until I was in my mid 20s. I am more used to flavorful and rich tropical fruits so gravitated more towards the Hachiya and Hyakume types. When I had my first American persimmon and hybrids, they were a revelation.
People also eat fruits at various stages. Mangoes are often eaten unripe with salt and spices. Guavas are another one that I personally prefer to eat unripe with salt and hot pepper.
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Big fan of chile mango. I like to get the chile-dusted dried mango from the local Mexican market.
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As far as Asian, I’ve only had a Fuyu. In the crisp stage, it’s barely “OK”. If it were a drink, it would be water with a faint taste of sugar. In the ripe stage, it’s fine but forgettable. The American varieties have a lot going on in terms of taste (sometimes that’s good, sometimes that’s too much in my opinion). However, they are fairly small, somewhat gooey/messy to eat, lingering astringency, and can be seedy. I’d have to try more Asian varieties to make a blanket statement, but at the moment I prefer American. I’m hopeful that hybrids can combine the best of both though.
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I like Ike.
Wait, not that, I like Jeb.
No, lemme try again, I’ll get it right.
I like both!
Or, if we’re being meticulous, I like all four or five (DV, hybrid, kaki PCNA, other kakis). They are different fruit eating experiences which I find myself favoring differently on the whims of my needs, wants, and mood. I’d just as soon swear off Fuyu in favor of perennially eating DV as I would swear off ham in favor of only eating salami, or Sauvignon blanc in favor of brandy.
That being said, I’m mightily biased in favor of good quality persimmons. A “bland” and “watery” PCNA from my own yard often provides a better eating experience than random chance serves up from our local wild stock. A lot of those wild persimmons are great–but sometimes, more often than my nostalgia and sentimentality would permit me to admit, those wild persimmons are very small, seedy, have defects, lingering astringency, and may or may not come with full integrity or a smattering of forest detritus adhered. Whereas that supposedly inferior kaki in my yard has a huge seedless fruit that is crisp, juicy, pleasantly sweet, pleasantly flavored, and less imperfect than the pope himself. In beer circles, among others, people sometimes talk about a beer that is very “drinkable.” Usually, it’s a lighter, crisp, refreshing beer, one you would enjoy having a few off and be none the more concerned. An imperial stout drinkable is not. But, and this is a big but, I want my PCNA kaki to be a good PCNA kaki, and my DV to be a good DV, much as how I want my dark berry fig to be a dense, complex, flavor experience, not an under-ripe but already tainted with fermented off-flavors, split waste of a fig-shaped space.
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For you Clark. It took me a second to find this. You can watch the whole thing which goes through the Asians, but I should have it starting at the part that you will enjoy. That’s the reaction you want.
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Yes sir. I don’t have a photo of my own handy, but this is what they look like.
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I am a newbie to persimmon land but I prefer subacid fruits in general — don’t like cavendish bananas or Fuji apples, love peaches and macs and mangos and tangerines — I just really like firm / cronch fruit, and you can cronch a kaki but not cronch a hachiya…
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You should be able to likely forage some, they grow all over my area and this time of year they are very easy to spot as the leaves are gone and you just see the ping pong sized orange fruits coating the trees
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I wish, I am literally in a forest and nearby other forests, never seen one.
Someone said Walmart had trees of American persimmons? Maybe I could find one there.
Until then, I have one NG in the ground, one NG coming (warranty replacement) and a Saijo on order. I intend to try fresh and dried. I did not order Fuyu or Hatchiya as I didn’t care for either of them and I can find both at the farmers market and grocery stores so why grow? I wanted to expand on variety options. And Saijo looks a nice drying size, should dry faster than much bigger hatchiya.
I also have a dozen paw paw seedlings that I intend to plant in a row throughout the forest, as they are understory trees. I need to make sure they don’t invade the old logging roads though. If I don’t like them, I am sure the wildlife will. Yet another fruit I’ve never tried and can’t find locally.
My plan is it’s OK if I don’t like something because I’m sure someone else will and I can always have a little stand at a farmers market. It bothers me that I’ve never got to try American persimmon or a paw paw simply due to no local availability
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Are you in the west? There are no extant species of persimmon native to the western US. The only native persimmons you’ll find in the west are fossils, sadly.
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I am in the PNW.
Well then, that explains why I have a hard time finding them.
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Yeah, if you were really, really old, you might remember some Diospyrus oreganiana trees back during your late Miocene childhood, but I’m guessing you’re not that old. ; )
Darn ice ages, so much lost biodiversity.
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I guess Texas Persimmon (Diospyros texana) is different than Black Sapote (Diospyros nigra). Looks very similar though. Black Sapote had mute of a muted/mild chocolate flavor.
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