Wood Apple Fruit

Wood apple is a fruit tree of tropical area which has been known as a fruit contains antiseptic properties and high nutrition value. However, there are less researches have been conducted on wood apple fruit.

It’s said wood apple is native in the wild of India and Ceylon but it’s now grown throughout countries of Southeast Asia. In Cambodia, wood apple grown throughout the country. People just plant one or two trees near their house, in their farm and forget about it, until the trees start bearing fruits.
Wood Apple has got scientific name as Limonia acidissima L. and its other names are elephant apple, monkey fruit, curd fruit, Koth Bell (India). In Khmer wood apple is called Khvet (ខ្វិត).

young wood apple opened up, one fruit cost 500 Riels = USD 0.12. These are fruits after soaked in water. The rind are no more look green.

Wood apple is a slow growing tree which starts bearing fruit after 6-7 years planted. Its branches are upward reaching and there are sharp spines of about 2-5 cm long. The tree trunk is cover with ridged bark. Leaves are dark green and pinnate with 5-7 leaflets, they have slight smell of lemon. Flowers are small with greenish outer and dull-red inner. Fruits are ball-like round, they could be from 7- 9 cm in diameter which cover by a hard grayish-white, woody thick rind. The inside of the fruit are edible. Its pulp is light brown and turn to be dark brown when it’s ripe. It’s odorous with sweet and sour tastes. Seeds are white and small mixed inside the pulp.

Wood apple in Cambodia

ripe wood apple fruits

The season of wood apple in Cambodia is between November to January, however, wood apple is still available all year round. Young wood apple (before mature) is more popular for Cambodians than ripe fruit. The young fruit after take out the rind, are sliced into pieces and kneaded with salt, sugar, and chilly. It’s the same way of kneading green mango. But the pulp of young wood apple fruit is somehow bitter (as the taste of an unripe guava or even stronger). So after harvest, the young wood apple fruit is soaked in water for one day to decrease bitter taste, if not it might be hard to swallow.

ripe wood apple fruits opened up

The ripe fruits are usually kept to fall off from the tree. When the fruits are ripe, they attract people by its aroma. Ripe fruit is eating with sugar or without sugar if you like more sour taste. Use spoon to take out the pulp, put into your mouth, start chewing, you will feel a mixture of flavor in which some sweet, some sour, sticky pulp and crispy seeds. Especially its aroma, these all made wood apple become a unique fruit.

How to break up wood apple fruit

Because of the rind are hard, to break up, grabbing the fruit and throw it onto the hard surface, by this we will not need to use a hammer.

Young wood apple with salt, sugar and chilly eating as fruit snack in Cambodia

There is another way to remove the rind of wood apple by using a large wood stick hit around the fruit to break the rind into small pieces, then use a sharp-pointed knife to remove each small piece of the rind out.
Ripe fruits are easier to break up, just hit the fruit into hard surface, maybe the floor.

Cambodia people usually make a joke to someone who has no job by saying to offer them a job and when the person asks what the job is, the answer will be: need your forehead as a tool for breaking up wood apple fruit.

Source from: http://www.cambodia-picturetour.com/