White Birch Apples

 Ok this is one of my favorite rainforest fruits (I know I know will say that a lot but it IS true hay ) white birch apple or crab apple (Schizomeria ovata). Every time I visit northern Queensland I look for this one, it is a medium to large tree so depending on the size the fruit can be hard to get.

This year after not having visited for about four years one of my regular trees is way to high for me but one of the others I could just bash them off with a long branch then my friend Mick and I had to scramble around to picking them up off the ground all the while trying unsuccessfully to avoiding the green tree ants bites and stings, Mick didn’t understand what I was grumbling about because he had jeans on and I had bare legs and  lets just say they were not happy with us and they found me the easier target…..  They will be less happy with me when I get around to harvesting them and eating them which I will share as soon as I do. Anyway we managed to get a good bowl full of the fruit which once home I froze half and I decided I was going to use the other half in a fish curry, I covered them in water and soaked them for an hour or so then I squished and massage the pulp off into the water I then separate the seeds from the pulp then it is ready to use, my other favorite way to use these is in salad dressing as they are nice and tart hence the name crab apple I think, you can do the pulp thing or just crush them and put in the salad dressing as long as you remember the seed is in them like an olive, they go well in curries ect too.

This was sooooo goodddd and the fact that it was made from by produce from locally caught filleted fish makes it even more satisfying to me. When I create and enjoy meals like this I’m always reminded of how much food our rich privileged society wastes, there was about 1kg of fish skeletons/heads and this with a few bought veggies a foraged coconut/milk made enough food for six feeds or more with rice