27 August 2024

I came up with today’s slightly inaccurate title when I heard WESA’s piece on Pennsylvania’s secret tropical fruit, the pawpaw or “hillbilly mango.” In fact, pawpaws are not mangoes — they just taste like it — and their range is much wider than Appalachia. However it is true that they ripen in September.

Pawpaws (Asimina triloba) are the quintessential wild fruit for browsing animals that eat the only ripe fruit on the branch and then move on. The fruit tastes like mango and has the consistency of banana. But don’t eat the seeds. They are poisonous.

Pawpaws defy commercial agriculture.

• The skin is thin and bruises easily so they cannot be shipped.
• Pawpaws don’t ripen all at once. You must come back later for the next batch because …
• If you pull a hard, unripe fruit from the tree it will never ripen.
• Pawpaw fruits lose their flavor if you heat them.
• The bark, leaves, fruit and seeds of pawpaw trees contain the disabling and potentially lethal neurotoxin annonacin so …
• Do not dry or cook down the fruit because that concentrates the compound that — fortunately — makes you vomit. (see more in the WESA article).

However, the neurotoxin is a benefit for zebra swallowtails (Eurytides marcellus) whose only host plant is the pawpaw tree. Zebra swallowtail caterpillars eat pawpaw leaves, become toxic themselves and are protected from predators.

Pawpaw Festivals in September

If you want to eat a pawpaw and learn more about them, your best bet is at an upcoming Pawpaw Festival. The complete schedule of 12 festivals plus additional events are at Heppy.org: 2024 Pawpaw Festivals and Events. Here are a few close to Pittsburgh on the Heppy.org list in order of occurrence.

• Ohio Pawpaw Festival in Albany, Ohio, 13-15 Sept
• Paw Paw Festival in Duncansville, PA, 22 Sept, 9a-4p
• West Virginia Pawpaw Festival, Core Arboretum, Morgantown, WV, 28 September

Pittsburgh has two notable pawpaw enthusiasts:

Andrew Moore wrote the book on pawpaws in 2015. Pawpaw: In Search of America’s Forgotten Fruit. If you want to know about pawpaws this is the book to read!

Gabrielle Marsden is restoring zebra swallowtail butterflies to southwestern PA by planting pawpaw trees and encouraging others to do the same. Her YouTube channel is here. She also has two upcoming events:

• Facebook: East End Food Co-op on Sept 25
• Facebook: Taste a pawpaw at Grow Pittsburgh on Sept 3, 17 or 24.

Still curious about pawpaws? Learn more at this vintage blog.

Eat Pawpaws in September

p.s. Thanks to John English for pointing out the WESA article.