I never received your email but I would be glad to give you a cutting and
some of the fruit. How would you like to meet? I live in Leander.

"Ruth Shear" wrote in message
news
G'day

starlia wrote:

During the past week I have had about 15 more flowers turn into fruit.

Jealous sigh Want some recipes? Come on over to austin.food and ask
there.

I left one of the fruits on the vine assuming that it wasn't
big enough to eat. I have a blue passion flower and thought they would
get at least 1 1/2" inches in size before they were good to eat. It
seems I left the first one on too long.

What makes you say that?

When do I know when it would be okay to pick and eat?

Usually the skin loses the greenish tinge and is a purplish/ blackish/
reddish colour. Many (but not all) varieties will then start to crumple,
meaning an unripe passionfruit has a smooth rounded surface, and then as
it ripens it starts getting wrinkled or crumpled. I am assuming that
this is what has happened to your passionfruit and you think it is too
old. In fact it is perfect! Some varieties stay with a smooth skin right
through ripeness, so you can tell them by the colour change. Oh and some
varieties are yellow, and some yellow ones are elongated (called "banana
passionfruit" in australia). Some have very thick pithy skins. Some have
thin not very pithy skins. They all taste devine. The riper they are,
the sweeter they are, but they all have a great tang to them. I prefer
it a little before they are fully ripe.

Passionfruit will ripen off the vine, so if you have a
bird/animal/DrRuth sneaking in at midnight problem you can pick them
earlier (though I would wait till there is some purpleness, not all
green) and let them ripen on the windowsill.

Also, how do I get the seeds from the fruit? I saw a post
that said the fruit had to rot a little before getting the seed.

If you mean to plant the seed, then just let the passionfruit sit till
it has totally dried out, cut it open, wash off the dried up pulp and
plant the seeds. This works for me just fine when I have the selfcontrol
to not eat a passionfruit.

If you mean to get the seeds out so you can eat the pulp - forget it.
Just slice in half, trying not to lose the juice, and use a teaspoon to
just eat the lot. Well you can use a fine fine cooking sieve if you
really want to remove the seeds but it's way too much trouble. You don't
even notice you are eating the seeds - you are too distracted by the
great flavour of the pulp.

Oh - a hint when shopping for passionfruit at Central Market. They cost
the earth here, so you want your money's worth. Weigh them in your hand.
Go for the heavy ones. They vary a GREAT deal, mostly due to the amount
of juice in them.

Alternate Personality wrote:

I have a general question about passion flowers. I've got them, native,
all over my property.

I don't know about "native". Are they native to texas, or did someone
have one planted once and it has just fruited some year and spread
itself about.

Does anyone have any idea why:
(2) why I never see fruit?

It seems in general in the US, the different passiflora species are
grown for their flowers. I dont' know if some of them are bred
specifically in a way that reduces fruiting. As I said in answer to
Starlia's last posting on passionfruit, it is very unusual to get fruit
off a passionvine in Austin. It usually takes a number of years to get
to the fruiting stage and it is very hard with our hard frosts to keep a
vine alive many years.

Which reminds me..

starlia wrote:

If you are local you can have a cutting of the vine to see if it
gives you any fruit.

I emailed you starlia, but you didn't respond. I'd love a cutting.

DrRuth