In Florida, the Surinam cherry is one of the most common hedge plants throughout the central and southern parts of the state and the Florida Keys. The fruits are today mostly eaten by children, although I can't for the life of me figure out why. They taste terrible to me! In the past, many people allowed the tree to grow naturally and harvested the fruits for culinary use. These bushes are right on the cusp between me and my neighbors property line...I think they are really hers, but we usually trim them because the grow more on our side. These are all fallen on our driveway! They are terribly messy! I tried using them in recipes (like jelly, and sauces), but the taste is intolerable to me! My neighbor likes them.
I usually pay no attention to them, until I find thousands of them in the driveway...actually they fall into a third parking space on the side that we rarely use, so we don't see them until they are just suddenly there! I think I will go pick them all up and hand them to my neighbor so she can enjoy them!!!
6 comments:
I have never heard of these but they don't sound very appetizing. We have some kind of chrry tree in Wis. that is also very messy and not good tasting.
What strange looking little cherries. They almost look like little pumpkins. I imagine that it would be a nightmare to clean the red stains off a carpet if it got tracked inside the house. We have a tree with little black berries outside our apartment complex and occasionally the kids track it in and sure enough, I have purple berry stains on my carpet.
We have a little tree of this in our arboretum. It doesn't seem to have nearly as many fruits on it as yours do. But is says on the little sign that the fruit "tastes like turpentine", so I've never bothered to try it.
I guess you trim--she eats. Doesn't sound like a good trade! Are they bitter, or is it just the flavor you don't like? I've never seen these before. You certainly have a variety of plants that I've never heard of!
Aiyana
I was trying to think of a way to describe the taste of these things, and I suppose Cindy's description is best: TURPENTINE!!!
Why some people like them, I will never know!!!
Oh yes...we had one in our yard when I was growing up and we ate them hahaha they are so gross and I don't know why we ate them. I do know that as an adult I drank Mad Dog 20/20 and it tasted like those berries hahahhaha it was terrible!!
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