Monday, July 19, 2010

Ground Cherries!

Our first significant ground cherry harvest. Up until this point we've had the odd one here & there to snack on while we garden. But, BAM! We've got a pint of ground cherries all at once (weighting 3.5 oz)! This is thanks to netting the plants this year as last year the wildlife enjoyed more of this deliciousness than we did. As this bounty came just days before my induction date and the same day as picking 2 pecks of peaches, coming up with an elaborate & creative use for them was not in the cards.

However, because this is the first time we've ever had more than 4-5 at once, I felt like *something* needed to be done with them. Enter chocolate, an idea from the article that first inspired me to grow them. Behold the Chocolate Covered Ground Cherry:

I love how the paper skins act as little handles!


For those that have never eaten a ground cherry, they look kind of like yellow-orange tomatillos but taste more like a persimmon (in my opinion). They are really delicious and I recommend growing them next year as it's not something you can generally find in the grocery store or farmer's markets. Plus, unlike most fruits, these are annuals that produce a bumper crop the year you plant them. No waiting for maturing!

4 comments:

  1. Amazing! These were on my FIL's plate the other night and dinner and he gave them to a few of us. We had no clue what they were but ate them gamely. I was thinking berry of some sort? Definitely a fruit. No pit. Grape-meets-berry. As soon as I saw the photo I knew it was one and the same...the GROUND CHERRY! When you previously talked about it I thought you meant ground as in ground up cherries covered in chocolate. I wasn't sure why you'd want to pulverize cherries but I'm into anything dipped in chocolate, so I didn't ask...

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  2. What a fun idea! They look beautiful. I am excited for mine to mature.

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  3. Our ground Cherries are fallen off the plant and the husk is brown BUT How can we store them so they ripen without shriveling and rotting?

    Thanks Bunches

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  4. Once they fall from the ground, they are ripe. If you leave them in their husk & store in a cool, dark place they should keep for a week or more...if they last that long!

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