I have come across the CRFG’s description of this variety Nishimura Wase (Coffee Cake) that calls it mediocre. But it didn’t mention whether it’s pollinated or not. https://www.crfg.org/pubs/ff/persimmon.html
My own experience is limited. I have only sampled those that were either unpollinated and I had to freeze to remove astringency after I peeled it to determined if it’s pollinated., or the pollinated ones that were attacked by squirrels before they were even ripe enough to be picked. The color of the flesh is brown when pollinated. That could be how it got it’s name. I have not had a chance to try fully ripened and softened on the counter unpollinated Coffee Cake. I hope someone else with the experience will chime in.
This year my grafted Coffee Cake branch set a few fruits. I hope most of them will stay till they ripen, and I’ll try to resist peeling them too early to see if pollination occurred.
I have a mature Coffee Cake and two young Chocolates, so I end up getting about 50 pounds of a 9:1 mix of unpollinated:pollinated coffee cakes per year over the past few years. The pollinated Coffee Cake fruit are excellent, but the unpollinated are very high quality as well. I just treat them like a typical PCA variety (i.e. Hachiya or Saijo), and they end up very similar in flavor and texture to both… although maybe not quite as sweet.
Having said that, I’m very much looking forward to the Chocolates catching up and producing enough pollen to fully pollinate the Coffee Cake. The pollinated Coffee Cake fruit is fantastic.
Also, to answer a couple other questions posed here:
Coffee Cake is often incorrectly listed as a pollinizer for Chocolate. This is NOT true. Coffee Cake produces ZERO male flowers, and therefore does not pollinate any persimmons. Chocolate pollinates itself very well and does not need a partner, which is good because no other widely available persimmon varieties reliably produce male flowers! I think this misconception comes from nurseries recommending people get a Chocolate to pollinate the Coffee Cake… over the years this may have been misinterpreted to mean they are “partners” like a pair of apple trees that actually require cross-pollination to fruit.
Some persimmons are said to “require” pollination to set fruit, or that pollination can increase fruit load. In my experience, this is not true, at least for the ~20 varieties I have fruited. My persimmons have always been happy to set fruit loads large enough to break branches with or without pollination. However, I do not grow every persimmon variety in the entire world, so there may be some that need to be pollinated.
Thank you npolaske for spelling it out. I’d surmised most of what you describe, but it took years, and not all from one source.
Scott has described Chocolate as pollenizing itself (in years it has both male and female flowers).
When you get 9:1 mix, how to ascertain which are pollinated before they are soft? Or do you just let them all soft ripen and then notice which are brown and seeded inside?
Sometimes it’s obvious that they are pollinated… there will be several dark patches on the fruit. But unfortunately, the vast majority of them show no external signs. So, I end up letting many of them either soften, or I use the alcohol curing method if I want to eat some firm. I usually can’t eat them all so I also end up freezing and drying a lot, which also removes the astringency. I like having a mix of firm, soft, frozen, and dried, even if not pollinated, so I don’t mind this relatively “complicated” approach.
If it is pollinated, it becomes a true Chocolate persimmon with chocolate colored fresh, the tiny dark pigments are precipitated tannins and therefore isn’t astringent. But if it isn’t pollinated and the color of the flesh is orange, and it would be seedless, but good luck in eating it while firm! Chocolate persimmon is a PVNA type.
There are many ways to remove the astringency. In Israel, they poke the apex of the persimmon fruit with needles dipped in alcohol.
Another one is to dehydrate the persimmon. You can thinly slice an orange colored but firm hachiya or an unpollinated seedless chocholate persimmon or other astingent while firm persimmon and air dry the slices. They would be very enjoyable to eat without any of the astringency.
Sure! I take a very small bowl and pour in about 1/8 cup of the cheapest vodka I can find (although any hard liquor will work) and place the bowl into a very large Rubbermaid container. I then fill the container with persimmons and seal it. In 72-96 hours, the astringency is gone and the persimmons will retain much of their firmness.
My understanding is that the ethanol slowly permeates the fruit and once internalized, some of the ethanol is oxidized to acetaldehyde by the enzyme alcohol dehydrogenase. The acetaldehyde reacts with the tannins and induces a polymerization reaction. The polymerized tannins are insoluble, so they aren’t able to interact with the proteins on our tongues and create the “pucker” feeling that soluble tannins would. As joereal mentioned, the brown specks you see in the Chocolate and Coffee Cake persimmons are these polymerized, insoluble tannins. This is a completely natural process that occurs as the fruit ripens naturally… but the alcohol treatment method greatly accelerates the process and results in less cellular damage, which lets the fruit maintain more of its structure and firmness.
I believe this is how the “Percinnamin” you may see in stores is treated. I think it’s a Hyakume persimmon, which is PVNA, but it not pollinated so it maintains its astringency. However, they alcohol treat it so it is firm and seedless, which allows the fruit to be commercially viable.
Some big commercial fruit growers use CO2 to treat the astringent Kaki like Rojo Brillante Kaki so one can eat it firm which sale to Walmart once in a while.
I use Homer Simpson bucket from Home Depot. I pour a pint of the cheapest vodka on sale from Rite Aid in the bucket, then place the biggest fruit bowl that would fit in mouth of the bucket, and Then fill it with astringent persimmons to near full. I then place the bucket cover and seal with tape and leave it for a week. Then uncover and enjoy the persimmons.
Half of the Vodka evaporates, mostly the alcohol, and these are absorbed by the fruits and what remains isn’t good to drink and is thrown away.
@npolaske it surprised me to found out information on “growable.org” said Coffee cake persimmon produces male flowers.
‘Nishimura Wase’
Astringent When Seedless * - Early Season
Diospyros kaki
‘Nishumura Wase’ is an early cultivar, ripening its first fruit in early August. It is pollination variant and must be fully seeded to be non-astringent. It consistently sets male flowers. The fruit have soluble solids around 13% to 15% and are somewhat watery. The tree is well-spreading, somewhat vigorous and a good annual cropper. 3
The fruit is large and roundish. The tree is vigorous and easy to grow. It is called Coffee Cake for its rich flavor and brown flesh color when ripe. Unique spicy-sweet flavor that instantly evokes images of cinnamon pastry, hot coffee and morning sunshine. Coffeecake™ ripens about the same time as Chocolate and about three weeks to one month earlier than ‘Fuyu’. It is a non astringent pollination variant which means it develops its rich sweet flavor best when it is pollinized. ‘Gosho’ and ‘Chocolate’ are the best pollinizers.
Climate Zones: 7 to 10
And one of the member on persimmon website, her coffee cake has both male and female flowers.( the fruits shape are not like chocolate persimmon)
Gaily persimmon produces male flowers also.
‘Gailey’
Astringent - Mid Season
Diospyros kaki
‘Gailey’ is the standard pollinating cultivar and has small to medium size fruit. Concentric ring cracking is common and its pollination variant fruit are very dark-fleshed, even with small seed numbers. 3
Fruit small, roundish to conical with a rounded apex. Skin dull red, pebbled. Flesh dark, firm, juicy, of fair flavor. Tree small to medium. Bears many male flowers regularly and is an excellent cultivar to plant for cross-pollination. Has attractive autumn foliage and ornamental value. 4
Chocolate persimmon is much more heat and sun tolerant than any other varieties(Izu, coffeecake, matsumoto, giant fuyu) I’ve tried to grow in Phoenix. I need another variety to pollenate it. Are any other non astringent persimmon varieties known to be heat resistant? Or observed from your own experience?
