Wayne’s hand got sticky holding this sapodilla, all cut open and juicy.

It doesn’t look like much — a fuzzy brown orb between the size of a golf and tennis ball.  

Then again, who would expect the more cylindrical but diminutively brown fuzzy kiwi fruit to look so cool when it’s cut and taste so good? Kiwis seem like a grape, a pear and a banana had a menage a trois tie-dye spin cycle in lime green, jet black and snow white.

We spotted the sapodilla at small produce stand in Potter’s Cay, Nassau.

“What’s that?” I asked, pointing to the one unrecognizable item in the stand.

The sapodillas are between the tomatoes and gargantuan smooth-skinned avocados.

“A sapodilla,” the friendly produce woman replied, picking through the pile until she found a particularly ripe one.  She sliced it open, took one quarter for herself, and gave us the rest.

“They’re sweet,” she said.  “Don’t eat the skin, or the black seeds.”

The sapodilla was oozing with sugary juice.  It tasted like a pear and shared its grit, exuded soft, sweet juice much like a peach and there was also a creaminess to the flesh, like a vanilla custard.  Dessert!

“How much?” I asked.  “Fifty cents,” she replied.  I bought two.

Sapodillas are less creamy and exotic than a soursop (click here and here to learn about soursop and other unusual Caribbean fruit), one of my favorite Caribbean fruits.  Still, if you find a sapodilla (or a soursop!),  they’re definitely worth trying.

Word to the wise?  Learn from our sticky-sweet introduction.  Try your sapodilla over the sink, or with a moist towelette on hand.  Enjoy.  Then wipe.

If you’d like to learn more about sapodillas, click here.