My First Dragon Fruit

Each time I walked by the dragon fruit display at Chuck’s Produce for the past year, I imagined it tasting like the love child of a mango and papaya with hints of pineapple and kiwi.  And yet I denied myself this pleasure because it’s three bucks a fruit.  When I caught myself using this ridiculous logic a couple of days ago, I stopped and asked the produce man a couple of questions.  He pulled out his pocketknife and cut me off a slice to eat.  I briefly considered the cleanliness of his pocketknife and stuffed a bite of the white flesh speckled with black seeds into my mouth.  It tasted bland and slightly crunchy.  My eyes squinted into a question and he told me that it wasn’t ripe enough yet and that the fruit would ripen with time. 

I bought my gorgeous dragon fruit and sat it on my kitchen window sill.  Once there were white speckles of mold on it, I cut it open, just like the produce man had instructed. I chopped it up, sprinkled fleur de sel on it, took a picture and sampled it.  And it tasted like sweet Styrofoam with crunchy seeds.  Such a disappointment.  I can imagine using it in a salsa or a fruit salad, but the next time that I buy a dragon fruit it will be to decorate a fruit platter.  So, the next time I walk by it in the store, I’ll imagine that mango papaya flavored fruit and save myself three bucks.