Mayhaw Foraging

On Sunday, encouraged by our success with the loquats, Nathanael and I trekked to where he had seen a mulberry tree; alas, the tree was bare. I suppose others (perhaps birds) were hungry for the mulberries. However, just a couple of hundred feet away were two trees of another variety, both loaded with attractive ripe red fruits.

We weren't sure what they were, but their morphology led us to believe them to be related to a number of delicious fruits....so we agreed to only eat one each. (Actually the first thing out of my mouth was,"They look like baby pomegranates!" But they really do have their own vaugely apple-y look.)

The flesh was very soft, and tangy. It was sweet too, but mostly tangy...you probably wouldn't really want to eat very many of these fruits plain if you want to keep a settled stomach. Nathanael thought they might be mayhaws, but we still weren't sure.

Since we already had the box he'd prepared for mulberries, we decided to pick a bunch anyway; if they turned out not to be edible the only thing we would lose was our time. And after all, fruit collecting is a wonderful and addicting activity, so even if the fruit was no good, the time would be delightful.

And mayhaws they were. That coveted Southern jelly making fruit, which I would describe as a mix between a crabapple and a rosehip.

(I had not heard of mayhaws until a few days ago, so you're not alone...but isn't my husband a clever fellow?)

Lovely little fruits.

 

Did any of you notice I wore the same yellow shirt while picking loquats too? I love that shirt. I wear it all of the time. My sister Melissa, shirt dye-r officianado, gave it to me for Christmas. She has other comfy shirt's she's created in her shop, Everyone Original.

Nathanael lined a Priority Mail shipping box with a paper bag and it made such a nice container for our harvest.

We collected two gallons of mayhaws (not even close to cleaning the trees), and I have since turned them into 33 cups of sweet and tangy jams and jellies. I mixed some of the recipes from mayhaw.org (who knew, right?) and my pectin boxes and did my own thing. Boiling the fruit, using the clear juice for jelly, then reboiling the pulp and straining it through a wider weave for jam. 

As far as I can tell, Southerners in the US only utilize mayhaws in the jelly form, but one of my friends from Beijing told me about a haw fruit from a different tree in the hawthorn family. In China it is used widely in all kinds of savory and sweet foods, but most loved (especially in Beijing) coated with a candy layer and sold on a stick much like our candy apples. It goes by the name of bing tanghulu. (Also, check out it's wiki: tanghulu)

If harvesting garden vegetables while my family continues to experience snow storms didn't make me feel like I'm in a foreign land, discovering all of these unfamiliar fruits sure does. What other fruits grown in the United States that I've been missing out on?

Golden: Loquat foraging

As you already know from our pecan hunting, and from our extensive edible wild plant guide collection if you have ever seen our bookshelf, Nathanael and I appreciate the merits of fresh, free food. So, after the friend sharing her land with us (for our garden) pointed out one of her trees as an unknown fruit tree a few months ago, I took special note of the developing fruit each week...and I had no idea what they were going to be. Finally, this weekend, when I saw some falling off the tree I decided to test for ripeness, and ended up biting into something wonderfully delicious!

 

Nathanael thought they might be loquats, and he turned out to be correct. This warm climate fruit was something cold-climate-me had never seen or tasted. It is a distant relative of apples (and cherries, roses, plumbs, peaches, etc.), and has a texture like a plumb or large cherry. The flavor is sweet and tart, like a nectarine with a bit of plumb or berry essence.

 Inside, the fruit contains one to three smooth slippery seeds which pop out quite easily, and have a beautiful golden sheen.

Our friend's tree was sparse, but Nathanael recalled having seen a loquat tree planted on campus as an ornamental piece of landscaping, so we ventured out and discovered ripe fruit aplenty.

 

Nathanael was the primary harvester since he is a bit taller, and because I was eating so many loquats and taking so many pictures. But, I did collect the fruits I could reach.

This is me imagining the loquat popsicles I will make. (And looking a great deal like my grandmother.)

As we walked back I told Nathanael, "I am going to have a loquat orchard." I also told him that I would enjoy being a fruit bat, so I don't know how seriously he is going to take me on the loquat situation.

I am rather enamored with this fruit.

It is certainly on my top five list.

In other foraging news, we have begun to eat the first of the blackberries.

Aren't blackberries supposed to be around in July?!

This climate continues to amaze me.

Do you ever collect from the woods or city landscaping plants?

Have you ever tried a loquat?

What new foods have you discovered lately?