Great Food from The Philippines: Santol
by Dave from The Longest Way Home ~ November 4th, 2009. Published in: Great food from around the world.
A Santol fruit from the Philippines, halved
The Santol fruit is about the size of a grapefruit, but looks like a round pear. Once inside there are 4 -6 stones (hard seeds) that are covered by a soft white flesh.
The fruit needs to be peeled. The harder flesh outside of the inner flesh is quite bitter. And, Filipinos like to eat it with salt. While the inner soft flesh around the stones is quite sweet.
The inner flesh has quite a unique taste. Almost like rose hip or something very flowery. I enjoyed this fruit, though found it frustrating as the flesh is hard to remove from the stone, so I treated it like a boiled sweet. It did leave a bit of an after taste though. But worth trying!
This post is one of a series featuring Great Food from The Philippines.
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sounds interesting! is this the season for them, then?
I usually see them June/July but to be honest the only super seasonal fruit I’ve come across has been Marang. Everything else seems to creep in one way or another on the stalls!
I’ve never seen something like this. It sounds really different too. Another reason I like this blog!
-Renny- Yes it’s quite a different type of fruit!
After reading this story I am heading off to Whole Foods to see if and when this fruit is available. I’ve lost weight eating much fruit and I would and will try this. Sounds quite interesting.
thanks so much for the info.
I was in the Philippines for 2 months and was able to try almost everything, but I never came across the Santol fruit. Looks interesting and something worth a try.
I am reading your blog for quite a while now. I have to say that it takes me back to this beautiful country, that I love so much, every time when I read some of your posts. Thank you for the efforts.
Never have I heard before of this fruit. Your series of great food in the Philippines are very interesting.
-Adrie- Hi Adrie, Thanks for the comment. Yes it’s an unusual fruit, glad to highlight it a little. Also glad that you’ve enjoyed the series of great food from the Philippines!
The Santol fruit is very delicious, particularly the bigger ones. We have two kinds, the native (smaller) and the Bangkok santol (bigger and sweeter). Funny though, Bangkok santol is home grown. Or maybe the seedlings originally came from Thailand. The flesh can also be grated, peeled and preserved for use as souring ingredients for sinigang, another Filipino delicacy (sour soup with fish or chicken), or as plain side dish for rice.
Nowadays, santol is concocted into candies, juice, and other preservatives. I hope not as coffee. I have too much of durian already.
All the best,
Jojie