Jamaican Cookery News

Better known for its juice, passion fruit's tart taste can be found in drinks throughout the Caribbean. The juice's distinctive flavour can be found in numerous liqueurs mixed with everything from rum to cognac, and many fruit juice mixes. Fresh passion fruit is available in the United States and the juice and passion fruit-flavoured liqueurs (such as Alize) are readily available.

Passion fruit, a perennial woody creeper which is indigenous to South America, is also known as passiflora, apricot vine, maracuja, Grenadilla, purple granadilla, and yellow passion fruit, with related species in fragrant granadilla, red granadilla, sweet calabash and banana passion fruit.

There are two distinct; the purple passion fruit is indigenous from southern Brazil through Paraguay to Northern Argentina. It has been stated that the yellow form is of unknown origin, or perhaps native to the Amazon region of Brazil.

Yellow Passion fruit

Yellow passion fruit is common in Jamaica where it grows easily, requiring about 35 inches of rain annually. The plant does not grow well in intense heat. The yellow form has generally larger fruit than the purple, but the pulp of the purple is less acidic, richer in aroma and flavour, and has 35-38 per cent more juice than the purple variety.

The ripe aromatic fruit is eaten fresh and the best way is to cut the fruit in halves and scoop out the aril (pulp) with seeds intact with a spoon or eaten with ice-cream, yogurt and in fruit salads. The passion fruit seeds are edible and contained the  17 amino acids found naturally in plant protein.

Passion fruit is tropical, almost growing wild and is used to make refreshing beverages, desserts, confectionery, icing, sauces and ice cream. The unique flavour is appealing, musky, guava-like and sweet/tart

Nutritive valve: The yellow passion fruit is the most nutritious and contains beta-carotene. Passion fruit is wonderful in blends, because its strong flavour may mask any bitter or unpleasant flavours of the other ingredients.  Passion fruits are a good source of immune system-boosting beta carotene and vitamins C, B2 and the seeds are rich in dietary fibre.

Try this mango, yogurt passion fruit recipe
Ingredients
2 ripe mangoes
1 1/4 cup low-fat yogurt
2 passion fruit, halved
Method
1. Peel the mangoes, then slice the flesh from the seed.
2. Put the mango flesh in a blender and blend until pureed
3. Pour the yogurt into the blender and blend again, until combined, then spoon into glasses (about 4)
4. Using a teaspoon, scoop the passion fruit out of its skin, place a spoonful on top of each  serving and serve. Can be covered and stored in the refrigerator for up to 12 hours

Passion fruit juice
3 medium passion fruit, halved
Granulated sugar to taste
2 cups water
Method
1. Using a spoon, scoop the passion fruit out of its skin into a container.
2. Add the water. Use the spoon to stir the water and passion fruit pulp, then strain through a sieve.
3. Sweeten with sugar and serve with ice.