Soursop!

  

 Eating a soursop was, for me,  a primeval experience, one the YouTube guy with a spoon really can't prepare you for.

I'm adding the links here, for reference. Though they don't really tell the whole story, YouTubes have been really helpful to me to figure out what to do with these foods that are totally unfamiliar to me.

https://youtu.be/ZXYdmPmJm9A

https://youtu.be/Mn4FlTzRdF0

 The unripe ones look like dragons, green with spikes all over them. A properly ripe one has turned brown/black, almost charred looking and looks like fruity road kill.

The young woman on the video is quite right, an unripe soursop tastes like a not great pineapple. See the difference when opened up below:

Unripe; slices nicely, but does indeed taste like an unimpressive pineapple, with a similar texture.

The skin is hard, sort of like avocado skin, but with muck inside . But, oh, what muck! Hard to describe the visual and textural experience. An introverted Furby whose hair clumps are slimey, not furry, filled with eyes. But delicious. I don't know how the guy with the spoon managed it. What worked for me was grabbing the slimy clumps and mouthing them til I could spit out the seeds, being careful to avoid the skin, which was capable of breaking into small pieces the way a charred baked potato skin might.

I am saving you from the selfie of me eating it, beyond the hand shot. Let's just say that if the movie Tom Jones is ever revised, that erotic eating scene needs to be shot in Puerto Rico, with soursop and passion fruit as the foods.

Half was a stretch to finish, it was a big one. It's supposed to be one of the healthiest foods on the planet. It certainly is one of the strangest that this gringa has ever encountered.

   The first time I ever tasted soursop was in a glass of juice at Café 413, in Rincon. Less messy and very tasty! But this down and dirty foodie keeps hoping that a now elderly TJ gets himself a plane  ticket to PR. I'll be waiting for him in Rincon!