Growing up in Hawaii, our favorite fruits often came in brown paper bags from friends and neighbors. Freshly picked mangoes or mountain apples were some of my favorite treats. But the most popular has got to be the Chinese lychee.
Lychee (pronounced lie-CHEE) is one of the tropical fruits brought by the Chinese that have thrived in the warm weather of Hawaii. The trees with big bunches of ruby red clusters weighing down the branches were the envy of everyone in the neighborhood (and often the target of rascally kids who would just take some for an afternoon snack without asking <-- not me).
But with the growth of housing, it’s hard to find mango and lychee trees these days as yard make room for bigger homes. And for me, living on the Mainland meant I can only get these treats during visits home.
Lychees are one of those tropical fruits that are finding their way here from places like Southeast Asia or even Mexico. I’ve often seen fresh lychee at the Chinatown grocery stores, and were tempted to buy them but I shied away when I saw the lack of nice red color. To me, the light or pale color meant they were picked too soon, or the brown color meant they were past their prime.
Recently when shopping in Oakland’s Chinatown, one shop had a bunch of lychees and they were somewhat red like what I remembered growing up. So I decided to give them a try, especially since they were only $1.99 a pound. The bunch of lychee I bought weren’t super fresh (they start to decay once you snap them off the branch) but they were tender and a few were quite sweet. It brought me back to days when we’d sneak into the refrigerator and grab a bunch of lychee, peeling off the red shell to get to the white flesh and trying to gobble as many before our mother caught us eating that night’s dessert. Of course, we’d always get caught because the sweet lychee often meant sticky fingers and we’d often leave a trail.
So if you see them at the market, give them a try if they look nice and red. It’s one of those exotic fruits that will always be a special treat.
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9 comments:
Lychees and mountain apples were my favorite fruits as a child. I can still find good red lychee at the Asian markets here now and then, but I haven't seen a darned mountain apple in years!
When I was a kid I hate lychees because the taste is unexplainable but as I grow, I am starting to like the taste of it.
Great pics and very informative! I now feel as though I'd be comfortable buying some. One of my favorite drinks downtown is a lychee martini...but I'm pretty sure they use the canned version.
Jenster, I know, I miss mountain apples! I feel like only people from Hawaii know what we're talking about. ;-)
I'm an Hawaiian transplant as well, living in the Bay Area, and I love lychee, but I can't believe I have to pay for them now! Just like having to pay for mango or papaya! My fondest lychee memory is sitting in our tree in the back yard while picking and eating them straight from the branch. Sigh, the good ole days......
I love the canned lychees, I really must check out the fresh. Good to know about the red color! You've got me craving them now.
I remember when my friends' parents would occasionally show up at our door with large bags of lychee or mangos from their yard. They would practically beg us to take the fruit before they go bad. I'm reminded of this during certain summers when my neighbors and I do the "please-take-my-free-zucchini" dance.
Does anyone even know the mainland name for mountain apple? And has anyone found any outside of Hawaii?
The lychees I bought still on the branch at a farmer's market at Waimanalo Beach, Oahu, had the dark red color and what looked like whiskers growing from the shell. Know anything about them? They were totally delicious, survived the flight home, and lasted two weeks in my refrigerator at home. Now I'll look for them in Chinatown markets here in Seattle.
Jonis, what you're describing sounds like the "rambutan" which has the same white flesh as the lychee but the shell is different in that it has little spikes growing out that could be described as "whiskers." :) It wasn't very easily found when I was growing up in Hawaii, but now with the influence of Southeast Asia a lot of it is being shipped in. So I think that's what you ate instead of the lychee. (Lychee is grown in trees in Hawaii, but now a lot of them have been cut down for homes so a lot has to be imported.)
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