I love the name Quandongs and it seems to get everyone in.......I've had a lot of people ask me how to cook them .....they're a bit like cooking rubarb, you need to add a fair bit of sugar as they are fairly sour if you want to stew them to eat over cereal or as a desert with ice-cream.
Often known as the desert or native peach, although they're not a bit like them in look or flavour the name goes back to the days of the European settlers. It's a tart fruit with a large pitted kernel.
The Quandong is now grown as a commercial crop and the CSIRO have been studying it since 1973 to find out the ideal growing conditions...the quandong moth is a bit of a problem and when you buy them in dried version keep them in a cool and dry place.
The fruit itself is very high in Vitamin C (twice that of oranges) and has been a staple food in the outback for the Aboriginal people.
The best way to store Quandongs is in the dried form and to reconstitute put into cold water...approx 1 cup quandong to 1 ltre of water, simmer for a few minutes then leave to soak a few hours, or ideally in the fridge overnight. They will plump up to over twice their size and weight.
The liquid used for this can be boiled up with equal parts sugar to create a syrup and used over ice-cream or other deserts...."waste not want not" it's a fantastic bright red and so looks great drizzeled around the plate.
more on Quandongs and cooking tomorrow......
