Avocado

“ Of tropical fruits the variety is endless; some are good, others we do not care for. Avocado pears or alligator pears are pear-shaped, but look more like green and brown fresh figs. The skin is peeled off, and the pulp, which is green next the skin and custard-color near the seed, is about like baked custard in looks, and is eaten as a salad. The seed is very large, and confined in a loose outer husk. These are ripe now, and continue a long time in season. ”

“ Indian corn, cassava, yams, eddoes, tannias, sweet potatoes and ochroes are among the vegetables, while innumerable varieties of peppers are grown and used in large quantities by all classes. The dainty avocado pear, purple and green, grows readily. ”

“ The avocado shuns frost as an Epworth Leaguer shuns cocktails; and since there is no frost worthy of the name on the tongue of land because of its water-protection on both sides, Collins figured that avocado culture could be made to pay. He was right; and his avocado grove is now the largest in the world. The speed with which he worked, however, didn’t meet the approval of his one remaining partner; so Collins bought him out, becoming the sole owner of the narrow sand-spit with the avocado grove down its backbone. ”

“ The apple is perhaps the best all-round fruit of all. It is grown in many lands and climates. It is possible to get apples of various kinds, from those that are very tart to those that are so mild that the acid is hardly perceptible to the taste. Stout people can eat sour apples with benefit. Thin, fidgety ones should use the milder varieties. The juice from apples, sweet cider, freshly expressed, is a very pleasant drink, and may be taken with fruit meals.
The avocado is a good salad fruit. It is quite oily. A combination of avocado and lettuce makes a good salad. ”

“ Fruit-trees abound, particularly mangoes, sour oranges, and the avocado (alligator pear) . The last fruit comes to great perfection, whilst the mango is inferior except in a few localities, and is not to be compared to the “number elevens” grown in Jamaica. ”

“ Many other fruits that grow on this island were not ripe at the time we were there. They include watermelon, pumpkin, alligator or avocado pear, guava, groundnut or peanut, papaw, seaside grape, cocoa plum, cucumber, rose apple, breadfruit, egg plant, cashew nut, and mammee. Owing to the rapid ripening and decay of these fruits after being picked, it is almost impossible to export them with success. Pineapples, oranges, bananas, and cocoanuts are the principal fruits that are exported ”

“ It is a rapid grower, and forms a bush some 4 feet across by 4 or 5 feet high. It is a heavy bearer, and the fruit meets with a ready sale. To do well, the plants require a warm, free, well-drained soil, as they do not thrive where there is any stagnant water at or near the roots.
The avocado or alligator pear is not grown to any extent, though it thrives well, particularly to the north of the tropic of Capricorn, and can also be grown successfully as far south as the New South Wales border. ”

“ They are not filled, as a peasant's garden in England or in Ireland is filled, with potatoes and cabbages, or other vegetables similarly uninteresting in their growth; but contain cocoa-trees, breadfruit-trees, oranges, mangoes, limes, plantains, jack fruit, sour-sop, avocado pears, and a score of others, all of which are luxuriant trees, some of considerable size, and all of them of great beauty. The breadfruit-tree and the mango are especially lovely, and I know nothing prettier than a grove of oranges in Jamaica. ”

“ Other fruit trees, as the orange, the guava, pomegranate, avocado pear, golden apple, water lemon, soursop, etc. grow spontaneously on almost every plantation, and furnish an abundance and a variety of refreshing, nutritious food, at different seasons. Plantains, peas, cassava, kalliloo, yams, and several other kinds of esculent vegetables, some of which bear a close resemblance to the potato in every thing excepting the form, are raised in abundance with very little labor. The calabash tree is also found growing wild on every estate. ”

“ In America its actual area in a wild state is of uncommon extent. The species has been found in forests, on the banks of rivers, and on the sea-shore from Mexico and the West Indies as far as the Amazon.1460 It has not [Pg 293] always occupied this vast region. P. Browne says distinctly that the avocado pear was introduced from the Continent into Jamaica, and Jacquin held the same opinion as regards the West India Islands generally.1461 Piso and Marcgraf do not mention it for Brazil, and Martius gives no Brazilian name. ”

“ Row 13: sc. back across row—Ch. 1 turn. (Picking up the aqua and working with the avocado as you did in last row.) Ch. 1 turn.
Row 14: 1 loop st. in next 18 sts. Pick up aqua and working over the forest green using aqua and avocado, put 1 loop st. in next 13 sts. Drop the aqua, pick up forest green. With forest green and avocado put 1 loop in each st. to end of row.—Ch. 1 turn.
Rows 15—24: Work in pattern, watching the chart for the number of added avocado and aqua sts. in each row. Until in row 25 the aqua and avocado go all the way across rug. Drop forest green. ”

“ In a Dutch oven over medium-high heat, heat oil. Add chicken, onion, garlic and green pepper and cook, stirring until chicken loses its pink color. Add remaining ingredients and stir. Simmer, covered, over medium-low heat for 30 minutes or until chicken is tender. Adjust seasonings according to taste. THIGH FLAUTASServes 4 You can tell if your avocado for the guacamole in this recipe is ripe by whether it yields to gentle pressure when you hold it between your palms. If there's some "give" to it, it's ripe. If it feels hard, like a baseball, it's not ripe. ”

“ Place first 5 ingredients in blender or processor and blend well. Heat this mixture in a saucepan and simmer for a few minutes. Peel and mash avocados and stir into soup. Add sherry, salt and pepper to taste, and heat well, but do not allow to boil. Serve hot or cold. Decorate each bowl with two or three thin slices of banana for an extra touch of flavor. Serves 6.
23 FLOUR TORTILLAS
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon salt
1⁄2 teaspoon baking powder (optional)
4 tablespoons lard
1⁄2-3⁄4 cup lukewarm water
Mix dry ingredients, then work in lard until mixture is crumbly. ”

“ When used for this purpose the pocket from which the seed was removed is usually filled with broken ice, over which is poured a dressing of salt, vinegar and mustard or pepper, as fancy may happen to dictate. When filled with small cubes of sugar loaf pineapple and mayonnaise dressing, you have a “salad divine.” When taken this way, the aguacate is cut in half, the shell-like covering forming the bowl from which it is eaten. Owing to its content of oil, and other nutritious elements, the aguacate will probably go further towards sustaining life and producing energy than any other fruit known. ”

“ Banana Grove Pineapple Garden
The aguacate looks like a small squash rather than a pear. It has a kernel, or hard stone, as big as the fist. The flanks are laid open, the stone removed, [p. 29] and the fruit is ready to serve in its own dressing. Some prefer it with just a pinch of salt. Others add a touch of pepper. Many like a little vinegar with the salt and pepper, and a few even prefer a regular French dressing with oil, though that is apt to spoil the natural flavor. Epicures like it with sugar and lemon juice. ”

“ Cooked entire, and without any addition, the well-flavored apple is among the most perfect and economical of the subacid fruits for every-day use, and for the invalid's tray is seldom surpassed. Baked in its own juice, with sugar and additional flavoring, or boiled in syrup, it is relished equally with the breakfast mush, the dinner meat, and the supper bread and cake. Combined with cream, custard, whipped white of egg, or tapioca, which add nutriment without destroying the fruit flavor, it affords a delicate dessert, inexpensive and easily prepared. ”

“ There is scarcely a tropical product which this magnificent region does not or may not produce, gutta-percha, india-rubber, sago, tapioca, palm-oil and fibre, yams, sweet potatoes, cloves, nutmegs, coffee, tobacco, pepper, gambier, with splendid fruits in perfection—the banana, bread-fruit, anona, cocoa-nut, mangosteen, durion, jak-fruit, cashew-nut, guava, bullock's heart, pomegranate, shaddock, custard-apple, papaya, pine-apple, with countless others. The indigenous fruits alone are so innumerable, that a description of the most valuable of them would fill a chapter. ”

“ The fruit is pulpy, and covered with a thick green rind, of the consistence of leather, studded over with green prickles, cone-shaped, and attains a great size; the interior is cellular, and furnished with oblong glossy seeds, which spring from the spear-shaped core. The juice makes an excellent transparent jelly; but in its crude form the fruit is never introduced at genteel tables, although of a very grateful flavour: all manner of stock are fond of it, and the little negroes luxuriate most freely upon it when in season. ”

“ The islands produce the paper mulberry, from which their cloths and cordage are made; the acacia, used in the construction of their canoes; the banana, the sugar-cane, the yam, the bread-fruit; and, the most important of all, the taro root. Of late years, coffee, cotton, rice, tobacco, indigo, melons, the vine, oranges, peaches, figs, tamarinds, guavas, and many other plants and fruits have been introduced. The natives pay the greatest attention to the cultivation of the taro root. ”

“ The natives are of middle height, and have a most fertile land, yielding abundance of maize, yucas, aji, potatoes, and many other roots which are useful for the support of man. There are also plenty of guavas and aguacates, besides tunas [295] of two kinds, one white and of excellent flavour, caymitos, and another fruit they call cerezilla. The melons are of two kinds, also, those of Spain and those of the country, and there are all sorts of beans and peas. The orange and lemon trees abound, also bananas, and pine-apples of excellent flavour. ”

“ The Doctor told them that the material which she was weaving was abaca, or vegetable silk; and, while they were examining the loom, he explained how the fibre was grown and prepared.
"The abaca," he said, "is grown on the mountain slopes, and thrives best in a volcanic soil. It belongs to the banana family, and produces an abundance of seed; but the seed is not used for planting, owing to the long time required for it to grow up to be useful. The plants are propagated from cuttings taken from the base of the old trunk and set in the earth, where they soon take root and begin to grow. ”

“ Usually they [98] are between ten and fifteen feet high when they first bear fruit," said the Senhor. "It takes from three to five years for them to bear."
"When is the harvest time?" asked Maria.
"We have two crops so there are two harvests, one in February and one in August. Sometimes you see fruit and flowers on the same tree at the same time. The blossoms grow in little white bunches and are very fragrant."
"I should think it would take a lot of people to pick all this coffee," said Affonzo. ”

“ The wild or bitter orange is used for hedges, and the thick skin of the fruit makes a sweetmeat of some commercial value. The aguacate, better known to us as the alligator pear, is a vegetable fruit and is used as a salad. ”

“ EXTRACT FROM THE ACCOUNT OF DAMPIER'S VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD PERFORMED IN 1688.
The breadfruit (as we call it) grows on a large tree, as big and high as our largest apple-trees: It hath a spreading head, full of branches and dark leaves. The fruit grows on the boughs like apples; it is as big as a penny-loaf when wheat is at five shillings the bushel; it is of a round shape, and hath a thick tough rind. When the fruit is ripe it is yellow and soft, and the taste is sweet and pleasant. The natives of Guam use it for bread. They gather it, when full-grown, while it is green and hard ”

“ Here are heaped up mountains of golden oranges, red, yellow, and green bananas, cocoanuts, pine-apples, aguacates, anonas, and tomatoes large and small, jocotes, pimientos, limes, and sweet lemons, great bunches of flowers, endless bundles of green vegetables, and baskets piled high with fresh eggs; in fact the produce of every clime, from potatoes grown on the cold slopes of Agua to the sugar-cane from the hot plains of the Pacific coast. ”

“ After the harvest, the coffee-plants which were not disturbed during the summer are carefully weeded, the decayed and decaying fruit removed, and the [Pg 267] ground kept cleanly swept. Mamey, marmocillo, zapote, and aguacate trees are by reason of their splendid shade the chosen growth of a cafetal. The fruit of all is rich, juicy, and greatly prized in the cities, while in the country the abundance is in many instances a nuisance and an expense. ”

“ The bread-fruit is the most abundant of all the trees, and grows to a very large size; the cocoa-nut, the wild orange, and the lime, are all to be found. Bamboos, wild sugar-cane, wild nutmeg, besides many others, only require cultivation. Caoutchouc, gum arabic, castor beans, ginger, orris root, and coffee, will in time be added to these productions. Lemons and sweet oranges have already been planted, and promise a large product.
Swine are abundant and cattle rapidly increasing. Poultry of all kinds is very plentiful, and fish are taken in abundance. ”