Trying a New Fruit

In THIS POST from 2016, we tried different strange and exotic fruits.  It was a fun and adventurous thing to do.  Last week Tricia brought home a fruit that we don't normally get to eat here.  She found it at Wal Mart, believe it or not.  Although it is indigenous to Africa, it was introduced to Mexico by the Spanish and Portuguese colonists back in the 16th century. 

We've always eaten the fruit in the form of a Mexican candy shown below that we get when in Corpus Christi.  It is spicy and tangy and they are delicious!

The fruit I'm talking about is tamarinds and this is what the package looked like that Tricia brought home from the store:

The fruit are in the form of pods - bean-like pods that hang from the tree.  They are brown and the outside is dry when ripe.

To enjoy, you simply crack the outer shell of the pod and expose the fruit.  There are a few 'strings' that you remove before eating.

The fruit itself is sticky and sweet and tangy.  Some say it tastes like a sweet tart.

But you must be careful.  There are several 'beans' underneath the sticky fruit.  The beans are hard and quite large.  You'll want to spit them out.

But the seed is the only part you'll want to spit out.  The fruit itself is really good as evidenced by the fact that all of our tamarinds are gone!