Passion Fruit Juice

Passion Fruit is a wonderful plant to grow in Florida. Not only is it easy to grow on a fence, but the flowers are beautiful and the fruit of the edible varieties can be used to make juices, ice creams, and sorbets. 

The vines do best when planted on a mounded plateau at least 6" above the normal soil level in a sunny area either on a wire fence, at the base of a tree, or with poles put in the ground in a teepee shape. Mulch well, water, and provide compost or organic fertilizer 2-4 times per year.

It is best to wait until the fruit falls to the ground before using. Be sure to check for fruits daily, as raccoons will quickly discover fallen fruit that is more than a day old. Freshly fallen fruit is smooth, but will become wrinkly as soon as 12 hours after falling. Don't worry, the fruit is still fine to eat as long as there are no holes in the outer skin.

To remove the pulp, cut the fruit in half and scoop out the yellow pulp and black seeds. The seeds are not toxic and do not need to be separated prior to blending. Some people enjoy eating the pulp fresh and either eating the seeds along with it or spitting them out after separating it from the pulp. 8-10 average size passion fruits will yield about 1 cup of pulp with seeds. We generally process 4 cups at a time. Once the seeds are strained out, we are left with 3 1/2 cups of passion fruit pulp.

Recipe: To make passion fruit juice, place the pulp/seeds from 10 passion fruits into a blender. Add 4 cups of water and 1/4-1/2 cup of sugar. Blend thoroughly. Strain to remove the seed fragments. You can add more pulp or more or less water according to your tastes. 

Enjoy!