I’ll second jujubes. Followed by persimmon and pawpaw.
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Mine’s a little embarrassing, given that I can’t really even take credit for it. The fruit that is hand’s down the best tasting, the one I look forward to all year, is the “semi wild” black raspberry that grows around the edges of my property.
I didn’t plant them, and I put less work into them than anything else I grow, but OMG the flavor of those things is amazing.
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Same here, we’re waiting on our new berry plants and fruit trees to start producing. But we have stands of wild blackberries and black rasps that grow on our farm. I don’t care for the BB’s at all, too small, seedy and sour. But our blackcaps are very tasty.
Unfortunately, there’s not a lot of them around, they are outnumbered by the BBs by prob 5-1, but I’ve seen a lot of white canes growing last year that prob are new rasp canes, so we have those to look forward to this year. That is, if I can keep the boids off them…
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My favorite fruit to grow - Strawberries.
- Easy to grow
- Fast returns
- High in nutrients
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Mine sure does great here in TN! It makes tons of fruits and they are my very favorite tasting thing I grow. In fact, I planted a second one last year so I’ll have even more. The one downside, though, is that for reasons someone smarter about fruit than me will have to explain, my Spring Satin gets far, far more insect pressure. That isn’t just in my head and wasn’t just one bad year. If I spray it exactly the same time as my other peaches and plums and pluots, it still gets hit first, gets more bites per fruit, and if I spray everything together and the bugs are kept at bay for a while, they always start back on my spring satin fruits before all my other fruits sprayed with the same stuff at the same time. I’m talking about both PC and OFM. Even if folks say this doesn’t make sense, it is absolutely true- I’ve seen it too many times.
But let me scare anyone away from growing this incredible fruit…just be prepared to spray it more often. IT IS WORTH IT!
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OFM is evil… In my backyard here in Delaware, their favorite victims are the nectarines, to the extent that they almost completely ignored the Pluots. When I started spraying the nectarines more regularly, they started attacking the Pluots. I am planting a Spring Satin this spring, so thanks for the heads-up.
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So far figs because in our climate no matter what the spring or winter brings we get figs, and each year we get more and more. Also many of the fig varieties they fruit young.
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believe it or not, i have never tasted a fresh fig! had them dried but no one carries them up here.
Do you ever visit Vermont? They have a greenhouse there where they grow fig trees, they sell the fruit to restaurants and to people who visit them. They are supposedly not as good grown in a greenhouse yet maybe they found a way around that. I have not tried their figs yet. They are called Paradiso Farm.
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Moose & Klondike
I tole my three kids when they get a place to live, RASPBERRYS are a must in the back yard. My daughter is the first, and has probably a dozen varieties in her back yard now … heaven on earth.
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i have 5 types of raspberries here and really love them but i also want blackberries.
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The best-tasting fruit that I’ve actually grown myself…okay, I have to list my top three.
- First batch of 16 Babcock peaches I got from a very vigorous graft on my seedling peach. Now I’ve planted a whole tree! But it’s still too young for me to allow it to fruit–this is its first winter.
- The few scab and spot-free, properly cold-stored Winter Nelis pears that I’ve gotten on years when we got enough chill (so few that I am grafting most of the tree to other types, even though Winter Nelis pears are divine )
- My Pinkerton avocados, which I get fewer and fewer of, now that the really clever mammals in the neighborhood have figured out how to get them out of their mesh bags. Sigh.
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For me it has to be sour cherries, Juliette to be exact. We can them and eat a ton all winter. They make great sauce, pies, juice, crisps, and are better yet when served straight up with thick cream.
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got a juliet and carmine jewel potted in the garage I’m planting this spring. i can’t wait to get cherries! the sweet cherries we get seasonally in the store are very expensive. usually $5 a lb.!
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I’ll go with black mulberries (the real Morus nigra family, not just mulberries that are black), and mangoes.
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I recently came across this poem and even posted it here, if anyone wants to see it. However, it fell about as flat as any post I’ve ever made so apparently we don’t have a lot of poetry fans around here! hahaha (It’s ok…I’m not much of one myself!)
http://growingfruit.org/t/figs-a-poem-by-d-h-lawrence/13927
@chriso , I’m always surprised when I see people talk about mulberries as one of their favorite fruits. Undoubtedly the morus nigra, and perhaps others, must be dramatically better than the wild ones that grow around here. I ordered a Black Beauty a few years ago but I’ve come to believe it is not a real black beauty. For one, it grew fairly quickly-something I understand is not a habit of real black beauties. It also only produces VERY very small berries, like 1/4 inch or less in length. And for taste, they aren’t much better than the wild ones that grow here in Tennessee.
Anyway, I found your answer and others to be very interesting!
Undoubtedly, you were sold a fake black beauty…like I was…Real Morus nigra berries explode in your mouth with a sweet tart juiciness that is hard to explain. Imagine the best mulberry you’ve ever eaten, multiply by 100…
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ha! Yea, no doubt about it…I got ripped off. Mine was from Willis Orchard’s btw. Any chance that is who got you?
Yes, that’s the one