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- Title:
- Soft as Cream
- Date Created:
- 2021-04-07
- Description:
- European authors were challenged to describe exotic Asian foods for their compatriots during Spain’s second century in Filipinas. Dampier described Mindanao as growing a tree as large as an apple tree with fruit growing directly on the boughs like cacao fruit. He meant the durian that always made for a good story. The fruit “is about the bigness of a large pumpkin and covered with a thick green rough rind.” One wonders why he did not mention that the fruit is surrounded by sharp spikes. “When it is ripe,” he explains, “the rind begins to turn yellow, but it is not fit to eat till it opens at the top.” The ripe fruit inside sends forth an “excellent scent”. Once the rind opens, the durian fruit is quartered. Each quarter has several small cells, the largest as big as a pullet’s egg. “It is as white as milk and as soft as cream, and the taste very delicious to those who are accustomed to them; but those who have not been used to eat them, will dislike them at first because they smell like roasted onions.” Durian can only be eaten at its prime. Over a day or two the fruit blackens and spoils. Its seeds are roasted, peeled and eaten like chestnut, wrote the pirate. A durian paste is still used to make sweets documented during the Spanish colonial era.
- Subjects:
- Durian
- Exhibition:
- Dampier 1686
- Source:
- A durian variety called “Durio zibethinus” possibly after the civet ( Viverra zibetha) known to enjoy eating the fruit. Critics counter that the name is because durian smells like the civet animal (but not its fragrant musk secretion). By Hoola Van Nooten. Circa 1863. Wikipedia public domain.
- Type:
- Image;Still Image
- Format:
- image/jpeg
Source
- Preferred Citation:
- "Soft as Cream", Philippine Food History, Felice P. Sta. Maria
- Reference Link:
- felicepstamaria.net/items/coll201.html