Persimmon Fruit Benefits

Aside from cranberries, citrus and pomegranates, winter’s hardly the time we associate with feasting on delicious fresh fruit. Imagine my delight, then, when I discovered persimmons. The persimmon, when properly ripe, actually looks overripe, and feels extremely soft to the touch. I thought perhaps I’d let it go too far. But…Mmmm…like the best Scottish marmalade you ever tasted.

How to Eat Persimmons

The persimmon offers a flavor that’s rich, complex, even a little dark—rather in the way that an apricot is a little ‘darker’ than a peach. And truly, rivetingly delicious.

My favorite way to eat them: I prepare a nut cheese and then place pieces of a ripe persimmon on top. And, right now, persimmons are also my favorite green smoothie addition.

Origin of Persimmons

The persimmon is a delicate oriental fruit native to China where it's wildly popular and known as Shizi. It spread to Japan and in the nineteenth century, fortunately for us, it was introduced to California. The fruit comes from a species of tree in the genus Diospyros—fittingly, from the Greek meaning ‘food of the gods.’ The deciduous persimmon tree grows about 25 feet high, with the genus offering two categories of species: those bearing astringent fruits and those bearing non-astringent fruits.

Persimmon Varieties

The astringent fruits must ripen fully in order to be sweet, velvety and enjoyable—otherwise they can tend to be bitter and dry. Eat an under-ripe persimmon and you’ll you know it: Your mouth will feel dry and pucker, thanks to the tannins in the unripe fruit. Non-astringent varieties, by contrast, are crisp like an apple when ripe. The two most popular brands are the Hachiya, an astringent variety best enjoyed when allowed to ripen to jelly-like softness, and the Fuyu, a non-astringent variety eaten like a sweet apple.

Amazing things, persimmons! They’re fabulous examples of the principle that raw food in general, fruits in particular, are living foods: They ripe and change (from very hard to very soft, from making your mouth feel fuzzy to deliciously salivating!) merely by sitting on your kitchen counter. The enzymes within the fruit are still alive, and you can literally watch them at work day by day. It’s the same when you flood your body with raw and living foods—the effects are tangible.

Persimmons come to you loaded with Vitamin C and antioxidants (offering strong protection against damaging and aging free radicals). High in fiber, low in calories, they contain several minerals and most of the B-complex vitamins. They also offer betulinic acid, best known as an anti-tumor compound, as well as catechins, which are anti-inflammatory and help prevent unwanted bleeding from small blood vessels. Catechins would be an added bonus for those wanting to prevent spider veins and broken capillaries during the winter time when sensitive skin incurs damage from the cold and dry weather.

There’s a bit of a trick to buying and getting the best flavor from your Hachiya persimmons. Look for those with bright orange skin and a firm texture. These will ripen on the counter to a jelly-like consistency, the calyx will be easy to pluck out, and the skins may even start to crack, but once ripe they must be peeled and eaten in a day or two. You will have no trouble with that, however, if you include persimmons in recipes like these …