Forbidden Fruits

Posted on January 29, 2004 18:47 PM EST

Although my parents must be blessed for introducing me to so many fruits, they were also worse than the Lord our God. The Lord forbid Adam and Eve from eating just one fruit. My parents forbid quite a handful of them, the most delicious of them it seems. The typical reason was that these fruits would give us a cold. It was torture to be kept away from them. A worse torture was to be fed cooked and peeled apple. Yes, I remember being fed cooked and peeled apple as a baby, and protesting did not help!

I am a TOTAL fruit lover. That's my favorite food. No shaq ya savaal about it. If I ever find myself doing the diet thing, I will go fruity. Hee-hee! If it's to be a lifetime change, I will become a complete fruitarian. The best dish I ever had in a restaurant in my whole life is a fruit salad my father bought me when I was so young, I don't remember anything about that time. I don't remember how old I was, I don't remember where the restaurant was, I don't remember what we ate before the fruit salad, I don't even remember who else was there with us. All I remember is that delicious fruit salad in a big balloon glass. For years after that, I have tried fruit salads in many many places, but have always been disappointed. Nothing, it seems, can match that legendary first-time-in-my-life fruit salad.

Today someone asked me to name 3 of my favorite fruits. I was aghast! WHAT? Pick just 3 out of a dozen or so of my children? NO WAY! Fortunately, the blessed person let me list 'em all. I started to list them, and then couldn't resist telling something about each one of them and then found that I had my blog for the day. So, without further ado, following are some of my most favorite fruits:

Mango - when I was a baby-kid and we bought baskets of 'em, I remember eating 'em with one fruit in each hand. Raspuri is one of the most common varieties in Bangalore area, and I like it ripe and sweet and juicy.

Watermelon - I am crazy about this one. I am crazy enough to dice it into cubes and lug it for miles, across mountains, when on hikes. There is nothing like a watermelon eaten on top of a mountain after a hard climb!

Guava - I like the kind that is white inside. Not the pink. I like 'em ripe or raw (with salt and red pepper powder). When we were kids, this was a forbidden fruit cuz my parents believed it would give us a cold. Gotten into trouble more than once, trying to eat it stealthily. It was like a big treat when we were allowed to eat this one.

Jackfruit - Oooh! This was a once or twice a year treat. Usually in my grandmother's house. We would buy a BIG jackfruit and one of my uncles would start cutting it in the middle of the living room floor. The pieces of fruit would be passed around to everyone waiting all around. The whole house filled with its scent for a day or two. Jackfruit nuts roasted or cooked in a curry are yummy. Never liked them as a kid, but now I do. Been years since I ate this fruit. :-(

Papaya - There was a time when papaya trees dotted the landscape all over my grandmother's neighborhood. It was common for every house to have 1-5 trees. There was one summer vacation when I must have eaten a fresh cut papaya almost daily! I would keep watch for fruits that were close to ripening in my grandmother's trees or the neighbors' who were sweet enough to let us pick 'em. When we thought they were ready, they would be picked and allowed to sit in a dark corner of the kitchen until they were ready to eat.

Seethaphal - Ooooh! This is a rare treat. I never had enough of these. Why are they so rare? Also called custard apple.

Pineapple - Another well-liked fruit. Another annual treat. This must be my favorite fruit juice in India. After we got the blender (called mixie in India), we preferred drinking pineapple juice than eating the slices.

Eleneeru - Talking of fruit drinks or any drinks for that matter, eleneeru (that's the Kannada word for tender coconut milk) is tops, no. 1, absolute favorite. And the starchy meat inside called ganji - oh, it's food from paradise. Sadly, this was one of the most forbidden drinks when we were growing up. Right there alongside alcohol. All because my family thought it would give us a cold. I remember one evening when returning from school, my father had come to pick me up. He was in a great hurry to go somewhere after picking me up and I got it in my head that I wanted eleneeru, which was being sold right across the street from where he was picking me. I knew I could never swing it if I simply told him I wanted eleneeru. So, I put on a show of great thirst. He suggested that I get a drink of water from a friend's house which was just about 150 meters away. I wouldn't listen. I said I didn't want to do that, but I was really really thirsty, I want something to drink. I am sure my father noticed the eleneeru stand right across from us, but he was adamant too. He would not dream of buying me one of those. We argued back and forth for 10 min or so, while poor father kept looking at his watch. He was really in a hurry. Finally, he took me to a hotel close by and bought me cold badam milk! :-( Weird story, huh? Everybody is entitled to a weird childhood story or two or a handful!

Pomegranate - Yes, red and royal and juicy. The juice will dye your fingers, finger nails and clothes too. One of the prettiest fruits. When I think of pomegranate, eroticism comes to mind. I have no idea why! Could it be because the Dark Lord of the Underworld used the pomegranate seeds to trick Persephone into being permanently bound to him? Were the pom seeds in that story symbolic of something erotic, which only my subconscious mind recognizes? Weird! Does anyone know if the pomegranate is an aphrodisiac?

Panneerpazham - This is the Tamizh name. This is not a very common fruit. I wouldn't be surprised if most people here have not heard of it. It can be as small as a grape or as big as the eye of a cow. It is called panneer-fruit because it smells like rosewater (called panneer in South India). And it has a subtle sweetness that's delicious. A hard seed in the middle. I have also had the good fortune to eat panneer grapes. They are like black grapes with a rosewater flavor! Totally cool!

Rasabaale - Believe it or not, even the humble banana was a forbidden fruit when we were growing up. Rasabaale is the Kannada name for a certain variety of banana. The name translates to "juicy banana"! Hee-hee! It is a relatively shorter and stouter variety of the banana. The fruit totally deserves its name because it is the tastiest of the different varieties of bananas I have eaten. There were a few growing-up years when we ate them almost daily after dinner, in the summer. That was goood. There is another variety called naati (translates to "native") that looks very similar to rasabaale, but it's an inferior variety. So, gotta be careful when buying them.

Nerale - This is the Kannada name for a fruit that is also called Jamoon. It looks a bit like grapes, only it grows on a tree. It dyes your fingers and mouth purple when you eat it. Another fruit forbidden for the same reason: it could give us a cold. Grrr! I once went to an NCC camp where there were a few nerale trees near our barracks. I spent all my free time picking fallen fruits and eating them. Then one evening someone got a box full of these fruits, that had been previously soaked in a salt solution. Oh my god! That is the absolute best way to eat nerale.

Sugarcane - Is it considered a fruit? Doesn't matter, I am adding it here! Another mostly once a year treat. During the Sankranti/Pongal festival. For a week or so, we would chew and chew 'em everyday and the garbage bins would overflow with the chewed out roughage. The roughage hurt our tongue and mouth with bruises and cuts, and we couldn't eat spicy food later. For some reason, we believed that if we did not drink water immediately after eating a sugarcane, we would be spared the worst of the tongue and mouth agony.

Oranges & Moosambi - These don't get much press simply because they are so common and were not forbidden. Otherwise, I would be going gaga over them too. I had completed 12 years in this lifetime before I tasted moosambi juice for the first time. That was as a patient in a hospital. I was amazed by the great taste. Since then, I am a fan of moosambi juice. As for orange... My favorite memory of orange is teaching and encouraging my little cousin Pratibha to peel a fruit all by herself for the first time in her life. She was 3 years old or so, when I picked up an orange to peel. She said she wanted to do it. I had just sunk one nail on a side. I handed it to her and spent the next 20 minutes or more instructing, encouraging, cheering her on to peel it all by herself using her nails and fingers and both hands, not letting her give-up, although she wanted to more than once. Most types of oranges are very easy to peel, but this one was not too easy. Even an adult would have had to dig her/his nails in at certain places where the peel adamantly stuck on. And when our baby finished removing the last bit of peel all by herself, she gave a brilliant smile of triumph to me. That must be the most special moment I'll share with her, and one of the most special moments I have shared with any kid.

Grapefruit - I bought 2 lbs of these with my room-mates, during my first visit to the US, thinking they were big, yummy oranges. Man, were my friends disappointed by the bitter taste! They wouldn't touch the fruits after tasting a piece. I, on the other hand, totally freaked out on grapefruits. LOVED them. Ate them daily with salt and red chilli powder. This continues to be my favorite fruit for juice in the US. I sometimes add a little salt to the grapefruit juice.

Chakkotha - I don't know the English name for this one. It is the largest citrus fruit I have seen. It's the size of honeydew melon. It looks and tastes very close to the pomelo, although it's usually bigger than the pomelo. Who knows, it might BE the pomelo. This is another fruit we were forbidden from. One of my highschool friends had a tree of this fruit in their yard. I remember one afternoon when 3-4 of us kids sat on their open terrace and finished off one or two of these fruits with salt. It felt like heaven.

Believe me, whoever said forbidden fruits taste the best, knew what they were talking about.