Plant · P-501

Soursop

Annona muricata

Soursop is an evergreen tree that grows a large, spiny green fruit with white, custard-textured pulp that's juicy, refreshingly acid and pineapple-scented, eaten raw, blended with milk or ice cream, and even used immature as a cooked vegetable. It's one of the most cold-tender fruit trees grown, unable to take any frost at all, but it rewards a heated house or a large container: seed usually breeds true and a tree can start bearing 10 to 50 fruits by its second year. Its flowers are pollinated by flies and beetles rather than bees, so fruit set is often disappointing unless pollinated by hand, and the seeds and irritant sap in the stems are toxic enough to keep away from stock, poultry and children.