Pawpaw-licious

Okay, I was a bit skeptical. I mean, I got this handful of funny looking fruits that, oooh, taste like a cross between mango, pineapple, banana, and coconut. Is that even possible?! And they grow in Virginia? Cracking open my first pawpaw I smell that sweet, juicy tropical scent. The art of getting the pawpaw meat out of the skin must be an acquired skill. I tried to handle it like a mango at first, trying to score it and scoop it, but the skin broke too easily and those blasted seeds got in the way, so I had to end up digging in with both hands to gently scrape out the yellow flesh with my fingers.

Getting the seeds out was fun (well, fun if you enjoy messy cooking like I do). Digging into the bowl of mush with both hands, finding the seeds, and then trying to get all the meat off them. They actually have a membrane around them that if you grab it right will peel off quite easily. In the end I had five pawpaws of varying sizes that yielded about 3/4 cup of mashed meat. Dig out the ingredients for my banana nut muffins (substituting the pawpaw for the banana, of course), pull out my trusty KitchenAid and muffin tin, and pop the muffins in the oven.

The result? A delicious muffin that has a fruity, almost-tropical flavor. Can't quite lay my finger on what it tastes like, so it must taste like pawpaw!