Nisparo

 

It was fifteen years ago that our family went for a holiday to Majorca. We were staying in the small town of Puerta Pollensa, in the north of the island.  

 

 

 During the trip we visited a friend of Celias, a lovely woman called Antonia. She lived in a typical Spanish home of the region. A single story house, painted white, and with green shutters on every window. The garden was enclosed by a white wall, and typically had lemons, olives and nisparo.

 

We didn't speak Spanish, and she didn't speak English, but thankfully Celia spoke both, and so conversations were possible, and a lovely afternoon was had catching up with each others lives.

She cooked us one of the best paellas I have ever had, and it was shared around a large table with some of her family.

 

 

Of course, I took an interest in her garden, and in particular the Nisparo (or Loquat as it's also known), which I had never seen before. She had brought a bowl of it's fruit in for pudding, and the sweet and unusual flavour had made me curious about the plant. With Antonias permission, I picked a few fruit to take home, some to eat, and some to grow if I could.

 

Nisparo - Eriobotrya japonica

 

The seeds are quite beautiful in themselves, a shiny bronze colour. I planted one single seed, and have waited....and waited.

 



 



 Nisparo are difficult to get to fruit in this country, and would normally take around twelve years to reach a mature enough age to do so. I looked out of our kitchen window a couple of days ago, and there at the end of the garden I spied fruit forming....fifteen years later.

The seeds on our tree

 

Yay!...now they just need to ripen.