Melicoccus bijugatus is a fruit-bearing tree in the soapberry family Sapindaceae, native or naturalized across the New World tropics including South and Central America, and parts of the Caribbean. Its stone-bearing fruits, commonly called quenepa, kenèp or guinep, are edible. Other names for the fruits include limoncillo, Bajan ackee, chenet, Spanish lime, mamoncillo, and quenette (in the French Antilles).

Taxonomy

The genus Melicoccus was first described by Patrick Browne, an Irish physician and botanist, in 1756. This description was based on M. bijugatus trees which were cultivated in Puerto Rico. In 1760, Nikolaus Joseph von Jacquin described the first species in Browne's genus, which he named M. bijugatus. In 1762 Linnaeus used a spelling variation of the name Melicocca bijuga. Over the next two centuries, Linnaeus' spelling variation was used in almost all publications. A proposal was made in 1994 to conserve Melicocca over Melicoccus, but the proposal was rejected, leading to a restoration of the original version of the name. This fruit, known as quenepa in Puerto Rico, grows particularly abundantly in the municipality of Ponce, and there is a yearly celebration in that municipality known as Festival Nacional de la Quenepa (National Genip Fruit Festival). The fruit ripens during the warm summer months.

Description

Trees can reach heights of up to and come with alternate, compound leaves. The leaves have four elliptic leaflets which are long and wide. They are typically dioecious plants, though autogamous trees occur from time to time.

Flowers have four petals and eight stamens and produce ovoid, green drupes which are long and wide. Their pulp is orange, salmon or yellowish in color with a somewhat juicy and pasty texture.

Fruit

thumb|right|Quenepas fruit

The fruit is a round drupe, approximately in diameter, with a thin, brittle, green peel. The bulk of the fruit is made up of the one (or, rarely, two) whitish seeds, which are surrounded by an edible, orange, juicy, gelatinous pulp. There are efforts in Puerto Rico and Florida to produce cultivars with a more favourable flesh-to-seed ratio.

When ripe, the fruits have a sweet-tart or lime-like flavor. The seed, being slippery, is a potential choking hazard to small children.

Use

The main use of the mamoncillo is its sweet fruits, which are consumed fresh or canned, and can also be used in the preparation of soft drinks and alcoholic beverages. It can produce a strong yellow dye, although it is rarely used for this purpose.

The seed is a source of the soapberry toxin Hypoglycin A, which is also sometimes detectable in the fruit. Hypoglycin levels in the fruit may vary with ripeness, as occurs for ackee fruit. When roasted, the pit resembles chestnuts. The indigenous peoples of the Orinoco river consume them as a substitute for cassava, and in Nicaragua, the seeds are ground and made into horchata for use as a traditional antidiarrheal.

See also

  • Korlan
  • Longan
  • Lychee
  • Rambutan

References

  • Fruits of Warm Climates: Mamoncillo