An Acquired Taste

Day 355: This marks the fourth year my Akebia vines have borne fruit as a result of hand-pollination. I have only been successful in fertilizing the purple-flowered female from the white-flowered male, although this spring I thought I might have succeeded in going the other direction. However, the ovaries of the white-flowered vine only swelled slightly and then dropped, leading me to conclude that one or the other (male or female) is sterile. My success gave rise to an even greater puzzle: what to do with the fruit itself. Purportedly edible and even enjoyed by the Japanese, the "sea-slug" in the interior of the pod is a mass of sizeable black seeds surrounded by a thin translucent white goo. To eat an Akebia, you scoop out the slug, pop a portion of it in your mouth, roll it around with your tongue to get the sticky bits off the seeds, and at that point, you can spit the seeds back into the rind for easy disposal. You might be left wondering why you'd bothered. Each year, I've dutifully experimented with eating the fruit and until today, dismissed it as a pointless venture, but when I brought in the pod which had split overnight, I found it rather sweet and enjoyable. Perhaps it was because this pod was perfectly ripe, neither too green nor too mature, or perhaps I have finally acquired a taste for Akebia fruit. I'm looking forward to the next one, and there are 14 yet to come.