Marquisa telur kodok

Well, as predicted, no insects to play with today, so my house bug series grinds to a halt. However, a few days ago, while in the eatery just down the road, I eyeballed a bowl of fruit on the table. I had seen these fruits before, but had not tried them, so I added three to my purchases and popped them in the fridge for a future blip. My host obliged me by writing down the name of the fruit for me. I had never heard of a konyat before, but it looked harmless enough. So, my sporadic series on Indonesian fruits continues.

The konyat is about the size of a lemon. Coloring is yellow at the stalk end, fading to orange and mottled with yellow specs. It looks like a bad juggler had been playing with them, as all three carry bruises and cracks. This fruit feels like a very thin, brittle plastic shell with nothing or very little underneath, which would reflect the low cost of the fruit at Rp1500 (US$0.15 or UK10p) per piece. The skin was easily depressed, a bit like an empty plastic bottle. Incidentally, if I bought these fruits at a proper street fruit and vegetable market, the quoted prices would be halved. There is no aroma, so I am not expecting to get my taste buds ripped out.

I picked the most damaged sample to open, leaving the other two for the photograph. With no visible seams or break lines, I chose a plane and attempted to cut with a sharp knife. This obviously was not the correct way in, as the blade just slipped on the hard surface. I really wanted a clean entry, so that I could make a tidy blip of the inside, but the cracks and surface damage on the fruit were begging to be torn apart, so that is what I did. Clearly it was the correct method, it tore apart very easily.

Underneath the thin plastic skin was a layer of white, fluffy pith, attached to the skin, not edible. The skin peeled easily away from a soft, thin membrane which contained the seeds, held in a jelly, looking a lot like something you would find in a pond, left by amorous frogs. I cut through the membrane to reveal the inside and presented for the blip. The bed of chilies were there just for aesthetics, to pretty up the blip.

I sucked some of the jellied seeds into my mouth. The seeds were brittle, crunchy and tasteless, proving to be not a problem. I am assuming that the seeds are edible, as separating them out would be a nightmare. The jelly was very thin, slightly sweet and presumably the point of this fruit. The flavor was very light and the best that I can compare it to is a light grape flavor, but not.

Not an exciting fruit, but certainly not objectionable, mundanely pleasant I would say. Better than an apple, but I would prefer an orange. Given the choice of twenty konyat or a cempedak, I would take the cempedak every time. This concludes No2 in the fruit experience series.

I am now at the internet cafe, so decided to Google the fruit. I could not find anything with the given name, so I searched pictures. The fruit is called marquisa telur kodok, which is very appropriate as telur kodok translates to eggs frog, so my description was graphically correct, LOL.

Dave