Guess what happens to peaches when left in the fridge for too long?

Remember from a few posts back when I rambled on (and on) about the tropical fruit basket I received for my birthday? Thing is, it was a huge fruit basket with more than a dozen fruits (including an entire pineapple) and there's just one me.

Although I tried to consume as much as I could, a bunch of fruits were relegated to the furthest corner of the fridge. And that bunch included the peaches. Today, I was cleaning out the fridge when I saw this-

This needs a lolcaption. Halpz?

This, boys and girls, is what happens to peaches when left in the fridge for far too long. They attempt to grow an afro. 

 

I actually had goosebumps when I took a closer look. It looked like it was about to bust a move at anytime. Seriously, what the heck is that? These four peaches were all in one container and left in the fridge all at the same time. And why did it grow on just one?

A Tropical Birthday in Lyon

If you've read my last couple of posts, you'd have read all about me (kinna) moaning about being homesick and all that dramz. Last May 14, I celebrated my birthday alone for the first time in my life. It wasn't bad though, I spent the day doing chores and later on, Skype-ing with my family back home (they threw a party for me without me, hee).

This is me, pretending to blow out the pretend candles on my
(yummy Contis' sansrival) birthday cake from 6,719 miles away

At around four in the afternoon on my time, someone rang the doorbell and I got a delivery! It was gift from a cute boy back home. I knew it was coming, because he told me to watch for it. When he told me he got me something, I immediately guessed it to be flowers, because it's probably the easiest thing to have delivered to a different continent. Surprise, surprise, instead of flowers, I got a fruit basket!

The very picturesque fruit basket!

Too surprised to receive a very heavy tropical fruit basket, I took it from the delivery boy, closed the door, and forgot to tip him (whoops!). The fruit basket gave off a faint tropical scent (sorta reminding me of home) and the vivid colors of the tropical fruits brightened up my tiny little room (more than flowers would have had, I think).

In the basket, there was a huge pineapple, a very heavy melon, some apples, kiwis, and a handful of picture perfect strawberries. And although I've lived in a very tropical country for most of my life, there were some fruits in the tropical fruit basket that I hadn't seen or tried before (shame on me!). Actually, even with the help of Google, it took me a while before I figured out what they were.

It came with a handwritten note that said- "For best enjoy!"

Persimmon Peach (thanks to JP Hays)

The picture on the top left of the photo below is a persimmon peach, I think (correct me if I'm wrong) JP Hays says. If I had to name it based on looks alone, I'd call it a tomapple It's about the size of a small tomato and shaped like an apple. It's skin is thicker than tomato skin and is a kind of pink-yellow (does that make sense?).

To eat, you just bite into the soft skin like you would an apple. Oddly enough, the fruit lived up to its looks. It's rougher than a tomato, but softer than an apple. It's not as sweet as an apple, but also not as sour as a tomato. Like a hybrid!

Raspberry Blackberry (thanks to JP Hays)

That's the one on the right of the persimmon peach. Yes, I know what a raspberry blackberry looks like but I honestly haven't seen one or tasted one that's not preserved before I got this. It kina looks like a tiny bunch of grapes but the taste is much stronger, the flavor is almost bitter with the purple globes bursting juice in your mouth.

From top-left clockwise: persimmon, raspberry, (giant) mango, and passion fruit

Mango

Below the raspberry is a mango. Nothing new, right? Nuh uh. If you go back the the main fruit basket photo, the mangoes are the two large pinkish-yellowish blobs flanking the strawberries. It was very weird to see mangoes of that color and shape, I didn't even know it was a mango at first glance. It also didn't taste quite as sweet or as juicy as the mangoes back home.

Passionfruit

Ahh the passionfruit. Its looks are perplexing, with its dry outer shell a dull brownish color and wrinkled like a prune. It took me a couple of days of guessing (and Google-ing) before I even attempted to open it. And when I did, boy, was I surprised. Inside the sad looking cover was a bright yellow goopy mess. Its seeds, not unlike papaya seeds, are coated in phlegmy yellow passionfruit pus juice that smelled somewhere between a ripe mango and a langka.

To eat it, you simply spoon out some and put it in your mouth, seeds included. The flavor is most surprising. Seeing the sad and wrinkly exterior, you don't really expect the fruit to be a jolting citrus party in your mouth.

~

The rest of the fruits in the basket are your typical tropical fruits. Except they forgot to add in bananas (been hankering for good ones for the past week, to no avail). Getting a tropical fruit basket on my birthday was a really nice surprise. In a county not even remotely close to the tropics, it was a small bit of home.

The Durian Fruit - Delightful Davao (Part 4)

Davao is famous for being a major source of the king of fruits- the durian. Available in the city all year round, but most plentiful (and cheapest) in August (also the month of the Kadayawan festival), durian is something you should try at least once when you're in Davao.

King of fruits

Because of it's strong aroma, durian is a fruit that has varied reviews. Some enjoy the distinct odor of the fruit while others find it offensive and disgusting. Planes going out of the city do not allow the fruit as a carry-on, but you can bring the fruit in your check-in luggage (this doesn't really contain the smell, my luggage has a faint durian scent after EVERY Davao visit).

The smell isn't THAT bad

This fragrant fruit will be the topic of our latest entry in the Delightful Davao series. I'm in Davao every so often and the durian (and its smell) isn't anything new to me (the fresh fruit is ok, but I like durian best as a shake from Merco). To give you an unbiased opinion of this unusual fruit, we'll recount the experience of someone who tried durian for the first time.

Before durian

This is Bim, the Comicology dude (will also be referred to as the noob). It was his first time in Davao, and we wouldn't couldn't let him get away without trying fresh durian. We trooped over to the Ramon Magsaysay Park where durian fruit vendors are aplenty. The smell of the fruit that wafted under our noses as soon as we got out of the car made the noob scrunch up his nose and hold a towel over his face.

After durian

Surrounded by Davaoeños (which included my dad), he knew he couldn't back down from the challenge no matter how badly he wanted to. When the vendor broke the the hard, spiky shell of the fruit open and laid it down on the table, he had to toughen up, forget about the smell, and put the sticky flesh of the fruit in his mouth. Which he did.

It didn't go over so well. His face stayed in that i-just-swallowed-an-alien expression for a long time. I asked him to give me a one line description of what was going through his head that time and his answer is this- "F@#K EVERYTHING ABOUT THIS FRUIT!"

Yes, he was thinking in allcaps (and without censorship). Conclusion? Durian- it's not for the weak of heart.

(Click here to read the rest of the Delightful Davao posts.)

Thinking of Plump and Juicy Bangkok Lanzones

After dinner tonight, I was kind of looking for something tangy for dessert. Then I remembered last week's lanzones. My tita who flies to Bangkok regularly for business recently came back from a trip and straight from the airport, she brought us bunches of these very large lanzones pictured below. The fruits were cleaned right away and served in a basket to nom over chitchat. 

Bangkok Lanzones (25 baht/kilo)

And nom we did. The fruits were plump, juicy and sweet as can be. We finished several bowls of Bangkok lanzones among five of us really, really quickly. Just like Pringles, once you pop, you can't stop! Because it's so easy to eat and it's delicious, you wouldn't notice that you've eaten a bunch already. (It's healthy anyway. :P) 

Yellow Watermelons are Sweet and Cute

Hi gaiz! I hope you've had a lovely weekend like I did. It's been a weekend of good company and delicious noms for me. I'm a bit behind on chronicling my foodie trips and I really should be writing about last week's stop at Salcedo Market and Comicology's sister's fabulous cooking. Will get to that soon, I promise.

In the meantime, we'll talk about these anomalies that I came home to a couple nights ago-

Dino eggs?

These dinosaur-egg-shaped fruits are actually watermelons, only of a different variety. My dad got these funny looking things from Bulacan for p25 apiece. He says the seller called them pakwang dilaw, for lack of a better term. 

Shape and texture

They're a bit on the small side (smaller than the ones in groceries), and they're oval and pointier than usual. They also have the same texture as the regular watermelon, kind of grainy and a lot crunchy.

Taste

Yellow watermelons taste like your normal pink/red ones, the difference is that this variety is evenly sweet. The pink/red ones tend to be sweeter at the core and less so nearer the skin. These yellow ones seem to be sweet all over, which is fantastic. 

Sweeter than your average watermelon

It is a bit disorienting to eat yellow watermelons because we're so used to the pink/red ones. But after having tried the pakwang dilaw from Bulacan, I now like these better. They're juicy, sweet, refreshing, and cute too!