Jackfruit My Way

Well, in the end we had to try it out!

Some Saturdays ago (time flies…) we went to Brixton Market, in South London. We knew a bit about it, basically that it’s “the” place to buy Caribbean and African food. And it was true, of course . We found a lot of food shops with unknown foods, from each part of the world, in fact – I mean, also India and Middle Est. We didn’t buy a lot of things in the end (it’s a pity I don’t have any photograph of what we bought), just a huge piece of yum, 4 plaintans, 18 (small, fortunately) bananas, which I used to prepare a delicious jam, and a can of jackfruit.They did sell fresh jackfruit of course, but we were quite sort-of scared, as we’ve been told that it’s very though to cut and it happens quite often that the knife you use gets damaged. Anyway… I wish I had bought more than one can!! It was delicious, it’s one of those food that you can “play” with, such as tofu – I found it very versatile with an interesting texture. In my opinion, could be used as a good meat replacement, just like tofu, rather than as a vegetable.

Ingredients:
1 can of jackfruit (about 400 gr)
1 carrot
1 stalk of celery
1 clove of garlic
1/2 onion
2 medium tomatoes, finely diced
150 ml of coconut milk
paprika
salt and pepper to taste

Method:
Cut the jackfruit into chinks and set aside.

Finely chop celery, onion, carrot, garlic and fry them with a little oil in a no-stick pan. Actually, I’m on a fat-free period, so I just “stewed” them without adding oil or water, they’ll release a bit of liquid anyway. Let them go for 5/6 minutes, stirring almost constantly. When they start getting golden, add the finely diced tomatoes. Let it cook 2/3 minutes longer. Now add the jackfruit and stir. Let it go for 5 minutes and then add the coconut milk. Add salt and pepper (to your taste) and cook for 5 minutes more – or until the sauce reaches the desired consistency. Serve warm. You may also serve it with a bit of soy yogurt, or you can even add it to the sauce – I mean, while cooking. I suppose it’ll come out nice and creamy.

Should you want some additional information about jackfruit and how to “deal” with it, just click here. I look forward to buying it again, I’ve lready thought about a lot of recipes

Have a nice Easter you all. I hope I will be able to cook and, consequently, to post something.

1. monsoon 22 April 2011 at 07:32

   

   This is very interesting, didn’t know anything about jackfruit – beside the fact that it exists!

   
   
2. Lo 22 April 2011 at 22:05

   

   What a strange fruit! I wonder what it tastes like..!!

   
   
3. EleonoraNW3 23 April 2011 at 09:32

   

   Hi Lo! It’s really a strange fruit, you know. When it’s not ripe, you can have as we did, as a vegetable, I would say. When it’s ripe, you use the small orange fruits which grow inside the white flesh (and i suppose you discard the white flesh, not sure though) – therefore, depending on the moment of its life, is both a vegetable and a fruit .
   What does it taste like? Well, it’s hard to say… a bit like tofu, artichokes (or better, artichoke heart), but it also remember some kind of lean meat.

   
   
4. Moky 24 April 2011 at 01:48

   

   We just came home from the Asian Market with 2 cans, in hope to transform it somehow and fill tamales with it, but this recipe looks very interesting!! And easy, and I love easy!

   There’s this small veg restaurant in Bisbee AZ that uses it in burritos, tacos, tostadas, etc, so I’m hoping we can “mexicanize” it for tamales. I know it is used a lot for “not-pulled” pork sandwiches.
   We’ll see, in the meantime, I’ll copy this recipe and put it in my “to try” recipe notebook!