Malaysian Fruit

By Child 1

Malaysia is a flavorful country filled with an amazing variety of delicious foods and drinks. Restaurants selling Malaysian food, as well as Thai food, Chinese food, Korean food and more can be found everywhere throughout the cities of Malaysia. But stepping away from the noodles and aromatic hand-made dishes, you find the cool and sweet native plants that grow only in humid and tropical heat.

Fruit is a vital part of Malaysia’s menu. Many fruits are found in Malaysian grocery stores that could never be found in American stores. Crowded markets sell heaps of different varieties of mangos and bunches of bananas under tents and coverings. Exotic fruits such as star fruit, dragon fruit, and rambutans can be found locally.

If you are not familiar with these fruits, a star fruit is a green oval-shaped fruit with five long flaps, so that when you cut it up the pieces resemble stars. It’s crunchy but juicy, with a slightly tart and grassy taste.

A custard apple, as it’s translated in English, is a soft, dark purplish-brown fruit with small lumps all over it. The inside has mushy, white, and extremely sweet meat with black seeds.

A persimmon fruit looks a bit like an orange tomato on the outside, but if you touch it you’ll feel it’s hard. It tastes very sweet and almost cinnamon-y, and its texture is hard and firm (but not crisp).

A rambutan is a ball-shaped fruit that is red with green spikes on the outside, but when you peel it it reveals translucent white ball with a seed inside. It tastes like a lychee, or a like a big peeled grape.

The fruit of Malaysia is different from that of the U.S. It makes a delicious and unique part of Malaysia’s food, and now you can appreciate it for all its glory.