Tropical Fruits and Other Edible Plants of the World: An Illustrated Guide

Tropical fruits such as banana, mango, papaya, and pineapple are familiar and treasured staples of our diets, but there are many other interesting species that are little known to inhabitants of temperate regions. The tropical regions are home to a vast variety of edible fruits, tubers and spices. Of the more than 2,000 species that are commonly used as food in the tropics, only about 40 to 50 species are well known internationally. Illustrated with high-quality photographs, this field guide describes more than 300 species of tropical and subtropical species of fruits, tubers, and spices. Blancke includes all the common species and features many lesser known species, including mangosteen and maca, as well as many rare species such as engkala, sundrop, and the mango plum.
Some of these rare species will always remain of little importance because they need an acquired taste to enjoy them, they have too little pulp and too many seeds, or they are difficult to package and ship. Blancke highlights some fruits that deserve much more attention and have the potential to become commercially important in the near future such as the araza (Eugenia stipitata) and the nutritious peach palm (Bactris gasipaes) from the Amazon lowlands, the Brunei olive (Canarium odontophyllum) from Indonesia, and the remarkably tasty soursop (Annona muricata) from Central America. Features tropical plants used to produce spices, and many tropical tubers, including cassava, yam, and oca. These tubers play a vital role in human nutrition and are often foundational to the foodways of their local cultures, but they sometimes require complex preparation and are often overlooked or poorly understood distant from their home context.