My dad had a persimmon tree when I was a kid. Of course, I thought they were terrible and wouldn’t dare eat them but at some point, I started to love them. In Missouri, we could find wild persimmons in the woods but the deer loved them too so it was a battle for us humans to get them before the deer did.
If you aren’t familiar with persimmons, there are two main types – astringent and non-astringent. For the astringent variety, if eaten before they are fully ripe, you would probably never eat another persimmon for the rest of your life. They contain a high level of tannin, which makes them quite bitter and they seem to coat your mouth with a nasty feeling that just won’t go away! Yuck! Therefore, astringent varieties have to be so darned ripe that they’re almost mushy before they’re fit to eat. They’re great for making cakes, cookies, pudding and the like. The one my dad had when I was a kid must have been an astringent variety because those persimmons caused lots of puckering! As kids, we always wanted to try one but one little bite had us vowing to never eat another persimmon. Mom would make cookies with them after they were mushy ripe and those were great.
The non-astringent variety is what we like most. They don’t have to be mushy ripe before they’re good. In fact, the best time to eat them, in my opinion, is when they’re crispy . . kinda crunchy like an apple, but sweet like a juicy pear.
We planted one persimmon tree, a non-astringent Fuyu, and will plant more but I noticed over the weekend that our tree is blooming. Here’s a little more info about them.
Persimmon Blossom
I had no idea what persimmon blossoms look like and had to google it to be sure this is really a persimmon. Not sure what I was expecting it to look like but it wasn’t this. If you look at the picture on this page, you’ll see that our blossoms look pretty correct. It’s a pretty massive blossom compared to peaches, pears and apricot blooms.
I hope this means we’ll get at least a few persimmons this year.
Debi says
Judy – my friend got home (Aust) from the states and she brought back 100 blocks with your block in it – how great it was to see!!!
judy s. says
Living in Tennessee we have wild persimmon trees, but you never eat the fruit until after the first frost. That first frost is what sweetens them up. Don’t know how but it does. Then the deer and the oposumms love them. We also grow Milo on the farm and the deer and birds will not eat it until after the first frost. The seed people say it is not sweet until after the frost, then the deer and birds love it. Strange world !!!!
Marsha says
Pretty flowers. Good luck
Lee says
Impressive, and pretty blossom. Do they have a fragrance?
AngieG9 says
We had wild persimmons on the farm too, and always had to wait until after the frost to eat them. The wild ones are small, very unlike what you find in the grocery stores. My sister-in-law wanted to taste one when we were out walkin in the woods, but had heard about how sour the unripe fruit was, so my mom picked one and took a bite from one side that was nicely ripe and handed it to her. Unfortunately it was only ripe on one side and she got the not so ripe side and was sure mom did it on purpose. Some family issues are hard to mend, so be careful and inspect both sides when you pick a wild persimmon.
Lynn says
My mother, who lives next to us, has a young Persimmon tree as she loves persimmons. I think it is the same variety you have. It is autumn here in New Zealand so the tree is bearing pretty, large, orange fruit. She tried on last week, and it was a little too hard, but they are now just on ready to start picking. A tree full of fruit is such a lovely sight.
Jeanette Shouse says
We had a large persimmon tree that had to wait until frost. They could look so pretty and enticing, but don’t bite. There were other trees that my grandma called summer simmons. They got ripe a month or so before the winter persimmon and did not need frost to make them sweet. We used to fight the chickens for the good ones! The winter ones were quite a bit larger than the summer ones.
Nancy B from Many LA says
We have a persimmon tree, but it’s an astringent. I don’t like the fruit, but our chickens love them!
Brandy M. says
THANK YOU for telling me there is a “good” type of persimmon out there! When I was growing up, we had a now-obvious astringent persimmon tree in our back yard. We could never figure out when to eat the darn things, and consistently had that icky dry/weird coat in our mouths due to trying unripe fruit. I don’t think I have ever had one that was ripe, and we lived in that house for 14 years!
Now I need to try a non-astringent persimmon!
You made me very happy just now…
🙂