Passion fruit – fresh, luscious and fragrant - stirring memories from childhood - published in Hinterliving September 2008

The passionfruit is quintessentially an Australian back garden “yard” feature, climbing over the fence or trellis, alongside the lemon tree of course.

It is an attractive, luxuriant evergreen creeper, with large colourful flowers and delicious fruit.  To the Spanish conquistadores, who found this fruit growing wild in Brazil, the flower and its parts symbolised the crucifixion, hence its name from the Latin passus – suffering. 

I have very fond memories of my mother making her favourite dessert, Pavlova, layering the topping with freshly cut bananas and Chantilly cream, and covering the top with passionfruit.  It was always well received and looked so attractive with the glistening passionfruit juices and seeds.  One of the last memories I have of my dear nana was her trying to remove the passionfruit seeds from her passionfruit ice cream – she did not realise what they were!  I frequently use the pulp and seeds as a simple, decorative and tasty garnish over crème caramel.

This tropical South American vine is widely grown in Australia and, once established, will tolerate even a certain amount of frost. Over 300 species of passionfruit have been recorded; a few are native to Australia and New Zealand.  There is the purple or black passionfruit, passilfora edulis, with its tart and sweet flavour; the golden passionfruit, passiflora edulis flavicarpa; and hybrids of these are those most commonly grown. Other species include the granadilla, passiflora quadrangularis, which means ‘little pomegranate’, and the banana passionfruit, passiflora mollissima. 

Banana passionfruit is more of a novelty than a serious contender in the fruit garden. It has elongated smooth, yellow fruit, about 10cm long, somewhat resembling a small banana.  It is hardier than the purple passionfruit and less frost susceptible, but it lacks the rich flavour.  Its lovely flower is amongst the most beautiful borne by any of the genus and many gardeners grow the vine over a pergola for show as much as for the fruit.

The passion fruit vine is not too fussy when it comes to soil, but it does appreciate regular feeding during its fruiting season, and it likes to be protected from the wind.  In the home garden, it needs a wall, or any sort of support, such as a trellis, up to about 1.5 – 1.75m high. It is better to have the vine spread out along a flat, high growing space like a wall or fence, than allow it to get too dense and clump, or it will not fruit as well, as the flowers need to be exposed to the sunlight to set fruit. Don’t be tempted to let the vine go its own way in the first few years of its life – judicious pruning results in a lot more fruit. 

It is easy to grow your own plants from fresh seeds in the spring – squeeze out the pulp, wash the seeds clean and immediately sow them in a mixture of equal parts sand and peat moss, covering the seeds lightly. When they are 5mm high, pick them out singly and pot into tiny propagating pots, allowing the seedlings to grow to 200mm high before planting out, 2 metres apart, in a row along your wall or fence.

Passionfruit matures between November and March, but in our sub-tropical climate we are fortunate to enjoy a small winter crop from the autumn flowering.  When the fruit has developed its purple skin colour it is ready to be picked, and it usually falls from the tree when ripe.  The passionfruit skin readily looses moisture, causing it to shrivel, and while this affects its appearance, the flavour and juicy interior are not diminished in any way.  To avoid this shriveling, pick the fruit early in the morning and store in plastic bags until you need them.  The fruit deep-freezes perfectly, and so can be enjoyed all year round. The most efficient, and convenient way of deep-freezing is to remove the pulp from the ripe fruit and place it in ice-cube blocks – freeze the pulp and empty the ice cubes into plastic freezer bags and keep frozen until needed. 

When selecting your passionfruit, look for the less vibrant, crinkly skinned fruit that feels heavy in your hand and has a rich passionfruit fragrance.  Avoid selecting the beautiful looking fruit with smooth, shiny, rich purple skins as they are under-ripe and have little fragrance.  Avoid also the fruit that feels light as it is old and the pulp will have dried up.

Passionfruit is delicious eaten fresh by simply cutting it in half and scooping out the pulp. It also makes a lovely garnish for other desserts.  It is a great addition to any fresh fruit salad and is an extremely versatile fruit that is easily made into cake icings, mousse, sorbets and ice cream, and as topping on the Pavlova and other meringue based desserts.  When made into a tart, it rivals the luscious lemon tart as a very elegant dessert, and a passionfruit curd is just as delicious as lemon curd. One of our favourite ways to use passionfruit is in a soufflé....a hit every time we make it!