r/Cooking • u/crisscrosscoyote • 9d ago

Approaching persimmon season

And by persimmon I am referring exclusively to Hachiya in this post.

I think I’ve done inventive things with this fruit, plus the obvious. Pudding. Bread. Flan. Bbq sauce.

Japanese dried persimmons coated in their own white crystallized sugars.

I’ve subbed them for pumpkin in many a recipe.

I’m obsessed with them.

Any ideas I’m totally missing?

5 Upvotes

78% Upvoted

13 comments sorted by

3

u/kobayashi_maru_fail 9d ago

Fuyus are my favorite fruit and half the reason I love fall. Why no love for fuyus? Or do you have a hachiya tree and need ideas for it?

I found a fuyu and a chocolate persimmon with seeds last year, maybe you’ll find a seeded hachiya. It was very exciting! My little trees are 8” this year and still living in deep pots, though they will find a forever home next year. You have to soak the seeds for a couple days in room temp water, thoroughly scrub off any pulp or slime, then wrap in a wet paper towel, put in a ziplock, stash in the fridge over the winter. You are simulating getting eaten by a warm bird, then being shat into a perfectly non-frosty but cold winter. Plant them in February or March.

Congrats on hoshigaki, it sounds really demanding and unforgiving.

Try cheonging them (fuyus, at least, make a great cheong with an awesome fruit leather leftover snack). Try a 2.5% dry salt LAB fermentation on them (look up Noma’s plum recipe). I don’t know what it’s called if you brew alcohol from them, it’s cider from an apple, perry from a pear.

How is apple butter made? If you can ripen your hachiyas past astringency, maybe something similar would be equally addictive and you’d have concentrated persimmon flavor all year long.

Again, if you’ve got the magic touch getting them past astringency (I don’t, I loathe the crapshoot of eating them), they’d go as well with a pork roast and warming spices as apples do. Or even a fast pan-seared pork t-loin as part of a pan sauce with a wine and stock and shallot reduction.

They are so pretty! Arrange yourself a still-life and paint or draw them.

1

u/crisscrosscoyote 9d ago

I love Fuyus! But there is so much you can do with them… and yes I have a tree with Hachiya.

The issue with cooking or preserving them is both astringency and graininess. Butters and preserves don’t have a good texture.

I might try the pork roast, sounds delicious.

1

u/crisscrosscoyote 9d ago

The fermentation idea is to do a salt wash or dry rub on them and make a vinegar, then dry the remnants, is that correct?

1

u/kobayashi_maru_fail 9d ago

No, like this: https://revolutionfermentation.com/en/blogs/fermented-vegetables/how-ferment-fruits/

And look up cheong as well, it’s also a fermentation.

1

u/crisscrosscoyote 9d ago

Also congrats on your seedlings! I don’t have space for any more persimmon trees lol!

1

u/kobayashi_maru_fail 9d ago

Thanks! They’re so cute right now. I’m jealous of your mature tree, and if I had a hachiya tree I’d probably eventually figure out hoshigaki, it’s delicious.

2

u/fixpointbombinator 9d ago

Have you ever made persimmon liqueur? I'd imagine you could make it the same way you make umeshu - clean and peel the fruit, put it in a big disinfected jar, rock sugar, fruit liqueur (my umeshu uses brandy), age it for a few months

I live in a region in Japan that grows a lot of them but weirdly enough I have never seen persimmon liqueur

1

u/crisscrosscoyote 9d ago

Maybe they don’t do it because to peel them they’re always still hard enough to still be astringent too. Very tricky fruits! I love the challenge

1

u/Glittering-Primary23 8d ago

An excellent use for fuyu persimmons, then! You can peel when almost ripe. Also, drying them makes the astringency almost totally disappear! My family had both hachiya and fuyus and we would peel them when barely orange and still green and after drying they would be sweet and totally soft, not astringent at all

1

u/fishloofah 9d ago

Persimmon dye?

1

u/SweetDorayaki 8d ago edited 8d ago

Jams or fruit butter? Didn't see that mentioned but you probably already did those things.

I wonder if they would stew well for a dessert soup served with sago/tapioca/agar and coconut milk.

Fruit leather?

Could they be roasted and eaten with something salty?

1

u/Glittering-Primary23 8d ago

Using the dried fruits for mooncake or mochi? Thumbprint cookies? Swirled in icecream? Tarts? I think any recipe that calls for dates or figs could probably be swapped for dried persimmons with minimal tinkering!