Tuesday, August 23, 2011

Tropical Fruit Trees Nursery

OK. False alarm! We will live another day to see another hurricane hitting us, but not Irene. She still may cause serious damage up North, but not in Miami or even in Florida.

Now, let's turn our attention to something else that's big, a jack fruit I saw today in Pine Island nursery, in the far South of Miami, on SW 184th street and 163rd Avenue. Here, you will find thousands of tropical fruit trees on sale: mango, longan, lychee, guava, jackfruit... You name it, it can be found here. This is by far the largest such commercial grove I found. As a side business, they also sell the fruits off their trees. Fruits by the kilos (or by the pounds for us here.) As a huge contrast to the jack fruits I showed you before, this is what jack fruits should look like. This baby weighs 24 pounds (you can read the scale,) freshly picked off the tree and selling for some serious $s. Do you see the sap oozing from its stem? You don't want that stuff on you, trust me! On the left you can see star fruits and freshly picked sugar apples in the green bucket below. These sugar apples are the "desirable" type and they command $2 for each pound here. Today I got to taste several kinds of longan the names of which I have never heard of, all from Thailand. That goes to prove I know very little about tropical fruit trees. Got to return to nursery school. May be I should come here and volunteer to be an apprentice.
Tropical nursery

2 comments:

Miami Culinary Tours said...

Quick note thai I also heard that Jack fruit is good for patients with cancer. In Miami you can have a smoothie made with Jack fruit (Guanabana) at El Palacio de los Jugos for those who would want to try it.

Cheers,
Grace

Miami Culinary Tours said...

Lan, I am trying to get a hold of you but I do not see any email on the blog where I can email you. Can you please email me at grace @ miamiculinarytours.com

Thanks
Grace