Does This Fruit Really Taste Like Chocolate Pudding?
I’m always a little suspicious when anyone describes a food by comparing it to something else. It feels a little reductive, maybe even dishonest. Tonka beans do not taste like vanilla beans; carob does not taste like chocolate; and rabbits, alligators, and frogs have never, ever tasted like chicken.
But every once in a while, one flavor profile echoes another in a way that triggers something in our lizard brains. Take Bunchosia armeniaca, better known as peanut butter fruit, a vibrant orange berry with notes of Smuckers, which our editor recently tracked down and sampled.
Recently I got the chance to test whether another fruit favored by Gastro Obscura lives up to its nickname: chocolate pudding fruit. Also known as zapote negro, black sapote, black persimmon, or Diospyros nigra, it’s native to Central America. While I was in Mexico City, some friends brought back a particularly large specimen from the Mercado Medellín. I was intrigued.
The hardest thing about trying a zapote negro is the waiting. Eating an even slightly under-ripe specimen is about as pleasant as gnawing on a rock-hard avocado. A chocolate pudding fruit isn’t ready until it seems on the verge of decay. We waited until it felt impossibly dense and the tiniest bit of dark liquid started to ooze from a crack.
Blend, freeze, and top your chocolate pudding fruit for the best experience. DIANA HUBBELL FOR GASTRO OBSCURA
Once sliced open, the flesh offered absolutely no resistance to a spoon. It was the color and consistency of raw brownie batter. Did it taste like chocolate pudding? Kind of, actually. While no one would ever confuse the two in a blind taste test, the custardy flesh certainly resembled its namesake dessert.
The secret to truly sublime chocolate pudding fruit, though, is to pop it in the freezer for a few hours. Mash the pulp with a fork or a blender, then freeze until semi-solid. The resulting texture is somewhere between a chocolate popsicle and sorbet, despite having none of the same ingredients.
This makes for a sweet treat, but if you really want to gild the lily (and at this point, why would you not?), then add toppings. My friends and I went ham with flaky sea salt, cacahuates garapiñados (candied peanuts), and shavings of dark chocolate from La Rifa Chocolatería. A fruity olive oil, a really good honey, or anything you’d put on a sundae would be phenomenal here.
YES I DO HAVE BLACK PUDDING FRUIT TREES FOR SALE ALSO HERE
Any questions or if buying, contact me HERE
