My adventures with a jackfruit

After listening to some hype about the magical jackfruit, I started to search.  The grocery manager told me that he stocks a couple of them every week but they go fast.  After a couple of weeks I finally saw one of these massive beasts hanging out next to a lot of other very insecure fruit.  If you ever want to have vegans approach and talk to you, just carry a jackfruit around.  I was asked "are you a vegan" multiple times.  Anyone that knows me, knows them there is fight'n words.

Little did I know jackfruit is expensive, however, the guy running the check out had no clue what it should cost.  After discussing it we finally agreed on $4.99, which after some research is stupid cheap for this thing.  The all powerful google tells me that in Texas a jackfruit can go from $2-$4 a pound, this thing weighed 10 lbs.  So I got a deal.

So when I got home I watched some videos about how to open it up and get to the goodies.  Every video I watched warned of the latex in the fruit.  I didn't quite understand this until I opened it up.

When I finally had the time to open it up, I grabbed a sharp chefs knife and started cutting.  It was pretty easy to cut in half but I immediately saw the liquid latex coming out of the ALL the pulp in the fruit.  It was sticky and messy.  It didn't take long to get it all over my hands.  I eventually had to spray Goo Gone on my hands (which you're not suppose to do according to the label) to get that shit off my hands and knife.

The first thing I noticed when I opened up the fruit was the smell.  It was sickeningly sweet and very strong.  I knew at this point that if it tasted like it smelled it would be too much for me.  One of the fruit pods came out pretty easily and the entire family tasted it.  It's very dense and chewy.  I didn't hate it but it's not something I would crave either.  The kids and Karie said it was "okay" but not a favorite either.  At this point, I'm glad I only paid $5 bucks for it.

I continued to work on it and I must not know the trick because getting the fruit out is a pain in the ass.  After 30 minutes I had only a handful of the fruit out.  Karie thinks it wasn't completely ripe and that might explain why it was so chewy.  I eventually got enough of the fruit out to try to make pulled "pork" with it later and got the rest out of my kitchen.  It doesn't take long before everything smells like jack fruit.  UGH!

What I learned:
1.  It's expensive, but you get a shit load of fruit if you can get it out (glad I got this for $5)

2.  It's very smelly (this can be good or bad depending on whether like the smell).

3.  It's messy and hard to cut up.  The latex coming out of it gets everywhere and is difficult to clean up without some sort of solvent.

For me, it's just not worth the effort and cost.  I still haven't made the pulled "pork" with it and that might change my mind, but I doubt it.  So next time I'll just leave the jackfruit to the vegans.