South America's Coolest Fruit

Where I live (in the North-Eastern USA & Eastern Canada), the typical fruit choices comprise of apples, pears, nectarines, and watermelons. On a lucky summer day we might splurge and get a pomegranate of course, but it's not an understatement to say the winter months cut our fruit supply short. Arguably the most welcome surprise of living in Ecuador was discovering that my fruit encyclopedia was going to double. Since Ecuador is on the equator, the climate in each region remains more-or-less stable all year, but the vast changes in altitude allow for dozens upon dozens of easily available fruit varieties. ​Beyond what are commonly thought of as "exotic" fruit, like papayas and mangoes, here are some of the funkiest ones I had the opportunity of enjoying. Note: The names are the ones my host family used to describe the fruit, so they're in Spanish, with translations when I could find them.
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Achotillo (English: Rambutan)

I ate these all the time in the Amazon since there was a huge achotillo tree in the middle of the Siekopai community I stayed in! The spikes on the outside are actually quite soft and can't hurt you. You eat one by breaking the skin in half with your hands, slipping the skin off the slippery grape-textured fruit, and doing your best to eat the sweet, clear inside by gnawing the tough seed buried in the middle. Each is about the size of a giant grape. They have a nectarine-ish taste and are worth the juicy effort, but take quite a bit of work to eat everything off the seed. 

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Tuna (English: Prickly Pear)

These are very watery, and their consistency is best described as a mix between watermelon and cucumber with annoyingly hard-to-chew seeds in every bite. For this reason, making juice out of tuna is a common way to consume the fruit, since the seeds can be strained out from the beverage. Tuna is actually the fruit of a cactus, as you can see in the picture. 

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Chirimoya (English: Custard Apple)

The size of a grapefruit when they're big and a baseball when they're small, chirimoyas are super soft, pulpy fruit whose insides are naturally divided into stringy shells surrounding smooth, almond-sized seeds. In Quito, these are more expensive than other fruit and range anywhere from $1.50 to $3.50 each. Chirimoya varieties can be found in coastal regions. In my opinion, these are more pleasant since they're not as gooey and they separate into parts more easily.

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 Uvilla/Aguaymanto  (English: Gooseberry/Goldenberry) 

While we can find these up north too, I had never eaten uvillas before going to Ecuador. My host family in Quito had a plant in the small garden space lining one of the enclosing cement walls, so I had them quite often. Uvillas are a bit smaller than average-sized cherry tomatoes, and have similar textures, but are more tart. Although I'm not the biggest fan of them by themselves since they tend to throw off the taste of a fruit salad with a sudden sour bite, I love to eat them dried. They mix in well with granola, too!

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Naranjilla (English: Naranjilla)

I learned the hard way that naranjillas have teeny tiny hairs on them that can pierce your skin like tiny glass shards if you try to pick them off a tree without being careful. They look extremely similar to orange tomatoes in size, especially with how the stem attaches. The juice made from these is delicious (they are not eaten raw). 

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Guanabana (English: Soursop)

My favorite milkshakes are guanabana milkshakes! These alien-looking, football-sized fruit look a lot like chirimoyas on the inside, but are significantly larger (and in my opinion, taste better). My host family in Quito often bought guanabana pulp in plastic wrapping from the grocery store, rather than the actual fruit, to make juice and smoothies. With a bit of milk and a touch of sugar, guanabana milkshakes are incredibly refreshing and taste a bit like tropical vanilla drinks. 

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Guaba (English: Ice Cream Bean)

Picture a flattened and extremely overgrown peapod filled with cotton-like fruit surrounding kidney-bean-sized black pits. That's a guaba. My first interaction with guaba occurred in an Amazonian indigenous community near the town of Tena, when I was taught to climb a guaba tree barefoot with the help of a band made from reeds. Guaba hang from tree branches and eventually fall to the ground when they're dried out. The key is to pick them from the tree before they fall to enjoy the white, almost styrofoamy-looking things hidden in their hard shells. 

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Guayaba (English: Guava)

The color of this fruit earns it a place right near the kiwi in terms of natural beauty (I would have only expected to encounter something so exotically pleasant to look at on some long-lost island). The sweet taste and smooth, almost dissolving texture are pleasant too. One can find delicious, guayaba-flavored jelly candies all over the place in Ecuador. My only complaint is that teeny 2-4 millimeter white worms often live inside of them, depending where they're picked... but those can be eaten too. Yum!  

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Babaco (English: Babaco)

These are like large papayas in size, but yellow-green, glossy, and shaped like elongated stars. When you cut through them, they are white/almost hollow  on the inside. The fruit itself feels like an airy-cantaloupe in density and the peel is waxy like cucumber. I've tasted some very satisfying jams and spreads made with babaco. I even met somebody in Canada's Quebec City harvesting them in a greenhouse!

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Granadilla (English: Granadilla)

To be completely honest, the first time I broke the hard shell of a granadilla and saw what was inside, I thought the grey, seed-filled pods looked a bit like fish eggs. I was never expecting such a delicious taste from such strange-looking googly eyes! They are quite easy to crack in half, and eaten most easily with a spoon. Although the jello-like texture (think what surrounds cucumber seeds, but thicker) can throw you off at first, it's not long before you realize that these taste like a magical mix between nectarines, melons, and something I can't quite describe. A perfect snack. 

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Sapote (English: South American Matisia)

For anyone who has eaten pumpkin or squash, the taste of Sapote isn't all that original, but the interesting structure of the fruit is why this one intrigued me. It almost comes apart in slices, like an orange, but has single black seeds in every stringy slice. 

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Taxo (English: Banana Passionfruit)

What's yellow/orange, furry like a peach, and breaks open to spill orange/black insides that look an awful lot like granadilla? Taxo! The inside of the taxo fruit tastes like a sour passionfruit with a texture like granadilla insides, but with harder seed cores. I like to eat them plain for a sour, crunchy treat, but taxo juice (with added sugar) is preferable to most. This way, the taste of the orange-colored, cucumber-textured seed envelopes can be enjoyed without the crunch.

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Pitajaya (English: Yellow Dragonfruit)

Unlike the pink dragonfruit I ate in Southeast Asia that didn't taste like much, this yellow dragonfruit is packed with flavour! The white fruit which hugs the soft, spiky skin scoops out with a spoon, and the black seeds are so small that they aren't noticeable. The texture is almost like a denser, smoother watermelon, if that makes sense. Trust me on this though: eat only one or two maximum in one sitting or you'll be sitting in the bathroom wishing you'd eaten less. 

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Pepinillo (English: Melon Pear)

For weeks, I thought everyone was just using the diminutive of cucumber (adding "illo" to "pepino") to talk about a cute fruit, until I realized pepinillos and cucumbers have little to do with one another. Although the purple stripes on the light green peel make it look like it might be packed with an interesting flavour, I honestly found it tasted like bland, watered-down melon Coolaid. Pretty though!

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Tomate de Arbol (English: Tamarillo)

Literally translating to "tomato from the tree," these are tart/sour/acidy fruit. I never saw them eaten raw, but they seemed popular because adding sugar masked the bitter taste. It has a surprisingly comforting flavour that can be described as a mix between carrot, pumpkin, and sweet red pepper. I like tomate de arbol best in dessert form, because that's how my host mom prepared them. Cooked with lots of sugar and cinnamon, the syrupy dessert was a favorite, even though the fruit made my tongue itch the same way kiwis do. 

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Maracuya (English: Dragonfruit)

Another granadilla look-alike! This one tastes a lot like taxo but in a familiar spherical shape instead of an elongated one. Like taxo, the taste is more bitter than sweet granadilla, and the black seed within the squishy orange fish-egg-like shell is larger. Strange description, weird texture, but delicious juice and desserts flavour!

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Horito (English: Orito)

Super cute banana babies coming through! The truth is, since the banana market is largely controlled by huge agroindustry giants, we only really eat one kind of banana in North America (the cavendish) even though there are dozens that exist. Horitos are short, fat banana varieties (with thinner skin) that take 5 bites to eat and taste great on toast. Very filling.  

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Grosella/Baya de Ganso 

Have you ever had a starfruit or green grape that is not quite ripe yet? That's my best description of a grosella. To be fair, I only had them on a few occasions, so I might not be doing them justice. I can say that they are shaped like small clouds or flowers though, so that gives them extra points. Other than that I'd say they're too tart for my taste. Perhaps there are ways of preparing them that I don't know about!

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Capulí (Capulin Cherry)

The best way to describe the outside of this fruit is like that of cranberry with a waxier peel, and the inside tastes like a juicy cherry but more liquid than solid. The ones that aren't so purple are more sour, so make sure to pick the dark ones!

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Chontaduro-Palm Peach

This fruit resembles a potato more than a fruit because of it's starchy texture and sweet potato/rutabaga taste when it's cooked. It comes from a tree that looks like a palm tree to me, but probably has a different or more specific name. They are boiled, and can be eaten directly from the avocado-like core when they're done cooking. They're a bit stringy in a sweet-potato way, and I liked eating them in the Amazon when I was too hot to eat anything warmer than room temperature.

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Mora Andino

Don't be fooled! These don't taste like blackberries, nor do they taste like raspberries, even if their appearance is uncannily similar. If things flavored as "mixed berry" had to come from one fruit, mora would be it. They are quite sour by themselves, so eating them raw is not common, but mora juice with added sugar (or mora ice cream!!) is probably my favorite after guanabana. 

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Uvas de la Amazonia

I can't tell you how excited I was when I discovered that my version of grapes comprised one of the many varieties this planet holds. When you pop one off the stem, juice wells at the hole. The peel is a bit too thick to enjoy with the fruit, but the white inside tastes surprisingly like grapes I'm used to but with a watery coating. 

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Cana de azucar (English: Sugar Cane)

I knew sugar cane existed, and I know I've had sugar from the cane plenty of times, but in Ecuador I had my first experiences sucking the delicious sugary juice from freshly cut sugar cane, and found a refreshing water replacement until I realized I was on a sugar high. Once the outer bark is cut off, the inside is soft enough to bite through, suck, and throw away. Honestly I could spend hours chewing these (and I did on a few occasions in the streets of Lago Agrio when I could no longer take the heat). 

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Mortiño

These blueberry lookalikes are part of the bilberry family, as are blueberries, but are a bit smaller and taste more tart. They taste like blueberries mixed with a sour grape and homemade cranberry sauce, if that makes any sense. The best way to eat them is as a jam on toast. Yum!

Other fruit I didn't yet try:

Badea; Borojó; Arazá; Noni; Níspero; Achocha; Caimito; Guayabilla; Kaki; Nance; Pomarosa; Motilon; Pinuela, Mamoncillo; Fruto de Pan; Ovo; Tamarindo