There are two things from the past that I have recently had a hankering for: wood rose trees and wood-apple fruits. For over a year, I’ve been asking people if they know where I can find a cutting of the wood rose tree, which I remember from gazebos at a club in my childhood. I loved to break its pods open and see the black seeds. Many cannot even recall such a plant, and it is sad to know how something that had once been familiar has almost faded from public memory. The wood-apple fruit, however, is one that everyone knows. Or rather, they remember its existence. Even if they may not be able to remember when they last tasted it. This fruit has slowly been disappearing from our palates, as I realised over recent months when this craving hit me and it became almost impossible to source.
Thanks to my good fortune, I found a vendor near the Mylapore market who had some wood-apples in stock. I asked him why I hadn’t been able to find it of late, and he told me that demand for the fruit has gotten so low that farmers no longer have an incentive to grow it. It is just not financially viable for them to do so. The wood-apple season that I remembered from my childhood is right around this time, in conjunction with the festive period and the colder months, and it seems that somewhere in the state, perhaps in a scarce way, there is a small harvest after all.
As I said, I have been craving this wood-apple chutney for months, and it means a lot for me to be able to share the recipe with you, since it took so long to source the chief ingredient! I consider this a “revival recipe”, one which I hope will inspire you to bring this fruit back into grocery shopping. This is the only thing that will allow farmers to cultivate it again as they did before.
Known as “kotha” in Gujarati and “vizhampazham” in Tamil, wood-apple is known to be a tonic for the heart and the liver, and is good for treating intestinal, throat and gum ailments. Many parts of the tree, including the pulp, also have anti-venom properties. It is a pungent fruit, which like jackfruit is something people either love or hate. Needless to say, I love it. My mother often made this wood-apple chutney for us when we were growing up, when the fruit was abundantly available.
This incredibly simple vegan chutney contains just a handful of basic ingredients: wood-apple, jaggery and chilli powder. Some sweetness, some spice and the fruit pulp combined together create an addictive dip that can be eaten in many ways. I am told by a Sri Lankan friend that they often eat their version, which doesn’t contain spice, as a jam on toast. There are of course innumerable recipes in different homes, communities and regions.
What I am sharing today is my mother’s recipe for wood-apple chutney, which I recall eating along with leftover rotis as an after-school snack. I used to think of it as being a part of the larger category of homemade condiments that she would make and bottle at home. Many Indians used to do this – do you remember those pickles that would last a whole year? We would reach out for these pickles, chutneys and more whenever we were in a pinch and just needed something to eat between meals. This wood-apple chutney always satisfied the craving. It’s no wonder that “craving” is really the only way to describe how I kept searching for it for months, and how satisfied I am to have found it.
Wood-Apple Chutney
(Yield: 1 cup)
1 wood-apple
3 tablespoons jaggery
1 teaspoon chilli powder
1 teaspoon roasted cumin powder
1 teaspoon/small ball of tamarind paste
Salt to taste
A ripe wood-apple gives out a faint fragrance and tastes a bit pungent on the tongue. It has a soft flesh of an orange-ish colour. You will know that a wood-apple is ripe when the fruit smells. Until then, there is no fragrance.
Scoop the flesh from the wood-apple and keep aside.
Instead of a blender, I used a mortar-and-pestle like my mum used to, which is the traditional way to grind chutneys. I reach out for it for certain recipes, even though we use the blender today for convenience’s sake. Blend the the wood-apple flesh, chilli powder, jaggery, roasted cumin powder, tamarind and salt to taste, either by hand or in a machine. Do so until it becomes of a chutney consistency.
Move to a bowl. You may enjoy it immediately, or refrigerate. It will stay good for 3-4 days, if it lasts that long. When I make bigger batches, I warm a little oil and pour it on top, so that it is preserved for longer.
This simple and tasty wood-apple chutney is a wonderful dish through which to discover (or rediscover) the fruit, which as I’ve shared earlier seems to be disappearing quickly from our markets. What are some of the fruits and vegetables that you recall from your childhoods which we rarely see anymore? Let’s figure out together how to bring them back into circulation. It’s important for us as mindful consumers to consider the origins of the produce we purchase and eat, and to be supportive of those who make it possible for us to do so. Looking forward to your ideas in the comments!
