After about two years in the ground, the red jaboticaba tree in my greenhouse is now ripening a few fruits for the first time – very exciting. Jaboticaba is in the Myrtaceae fruit family, and is native to Brazil, where it appears to be wildly popular, judging by the way every Brazilian I talk to gets very enthusiastic when I bring up the subject of this fruit.
There are a number of different species and varieties of jaboticaba, and it’s a complex group. Here’s my best understanding of them – if I’ve made any errors, please let me know and I’ll correct them. The genus for jaboticabas is called Myrciaria or Plinia – I believe the two names are interchangeable. The type of jaboticaba that was introduced early on here in Florida is a purple-fruited type, which in Brazil is called Sabarah. According to one of Florida’s leading jaboticaba experts, Adam Shafran of Flying Fox Fruits nursery, that purple type was introduced to Florida under the name Myrciaria caulifora, but is actually Myrciaria jaboticaba, and the more recently-introduced red-fruited type is the true Myrciaria cauliflora.
I’ve eaten lots of the purple jaboticaba before, and I love them, but this is only the second time I’ve gotten to try the red fruited type. The eating experience of the two is broadly similar: sweet and tart, with a texture kind of like a muscadine grape, except instead of musky muscadine flavor, a complex array of tropical flavors, with hints of spiciness, especially in the skin. Both are outstanding fruits. I’m just guessing, but I suspect that red jaboticaba might appeal a bit more to people accustomed to eating temperate-zone fruits – its flavor seems slightly lighter, more grape-like, while the purple has more complex, heavy tropical flavors teasing your tongue.
Reportedly, red jaboticaba comes into fruiting at an earlier age than the purple jaboticaba, and the red is supposed to have numerous crops of fruit per year. I got my red jaboticaba as a three-gallon sized potted plant and stuck it in the ground in my greenhouse in 2015 or 2016 (gotta check my notes on that), and it’s currently about 4.5 feet (1.5 meters) tall at first fruiting. My purple jaboticaba tree is about six feet (2 meters) tall, and it’s been fruiting for a couple of years now.
One distinctive thing about jaboticaba is the extreme speed from flowers to ripe fruit. While most fruits take a number of months to complete this development, jaboticaba fruits race through this process in approximately 30 to 35 days. This year I photographed the flowering of the red jabotica tree on February 19, and the ripe fruits on March 21, just thirty-one days later.
Jaboticaba trees make heavier and heavier crops of fruit as they mature. And because the fruits sprout directly out of the tree-trunk, on a heavy-fruiting jaboticaba tree you can’t even see the trunk, you just see a column of closely-packed fruits. This first fruiting was only a handful of fruits on this tree, but it’s a start. Barring any greenhouse disasters, I should be getting heavy crops of these wonderful tropical fruits in coming years.
#jaboticaba #Myrtaceae #Plinia
Update: As of April 11, just three weeks after harvesting the batch of fruit described in this post, the red jaboticaba has flower buds sprouting out again. This species has been described as nearly ever-bearing – looks like I might be starting to witness that trait.
Florida Fruit Geek 
I’ve never seen this fruit before. Sounds wonderful. Can you cut it open? I’d like to see the inside. Do you eat it as is, skin and all?
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They are indeed quite yummy. I’ll see if I can get a pic of the interior. Most people eat them skin and all, but a few people spit the skin out (it’s ever so slightly tough, just a hair thicker than an apple skin). The inside is a whitish, translucent flesh, with a small seed in the center that the flesh clings tight to.
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That’s so interesting. The way you describe the interior it sounds like a longan. Looking forward to seeing the pic 🙂
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Everything about this fruit is beautiful! I wish I could have those flowers in a vase in my house – stunning and delicate, yet this fruit seems to be intense in it’s growing.
I wish more of these beautiful fruits you talk about were available up north by me. We are usually stuck with our standards and for a fruit lover like myself – even our options can get kinda ho-hum.
I’m also the opposite of a green thumb so the fact that you can do what you’re doing with these plants is just mind boggling to me. Love it!!
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Thanks for the kind words, Courtney!. Yes, some of these fruits and fruit trees are really breath-taking. I think it’s deeply wired into our genes to search out good fruit – it feels like such a primal kind of excitement when I see a tree loaded with fruit.
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I’m really digging this fruit. The first time it fruited for me, last year, the fruit was really small and the seed-to-flesh ratio was disappointing, but this year it is a much more legitimate fruit. The tree is already in its second fruiting of the year, and is loaded. Excellent contrast of flavors between peel and flesh too.
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Excellent to hear that, Marabou. I’m looking forward to getting regular crops from this tree – hopefully multiple crops per year.
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Hello.I am from india.Can you send me some red jaboticaba seeds?
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Hi Sreejayan, thanks for reading my website. Check with Adam at flyingfoxfruits.com, he has a business selling fruit tree seeds by mail, and I know he has red jaboticaba seeds available at times.
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I have what I thought was a Jaboticaba but it’s fruiting for the first time this year and this happened. It’s fruiting on the branch tips. Any info on what’s going on here is much appreciated. Thanks. Tried to add a picture.
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That does sound like something other than jaboticaba. I’ll email you directly so you can send me a pic of it.
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Thank you for writing about your experiences! Our red jaboticaba has its first fruit, and I wonder how to know when to pick them. When they are fully red or at some other indicator? One fruit is just beginning to redden now. Thank you!
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Hi Raven, thanks for commenting. Since I wrote this post, the red jaboticaba plant has gotten bigger, and it’s been producing multiple crops a year. So I’ve had the chance to compare how the fruits taste at different stages of ripeness. What I’ve found is they taste good as soon as they turn red, but I think they develop even better flavor if you leave them on till they turn darker colored – kind of a reddish purple-black. But that takes another couple weeks, and during that time, they are very attractive to wild critters, so it can be a bit of a gamble leaving the fruits on the tree till they reach that stage.
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Thanks for your post. Do you think I could grow this in 9B without a greenhouse, as long as I covered it on any nights that it might dip below freezing? I’m an hour south of you.
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I think you’d have pretty good chances of success with that. Because this is a small growing tree/shrub, it’s pretty easy to throw covers over it in subfreezing temps.
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Hello, I’m Pedro, from Brazil, really happy to see you cultivating the “Jaboticaba” (actually we call it Jabuticaba) in US. It’s an incrediably fruit from Atlantic Forest, I have two of them! Anyway congratulations for your work.
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incredible*
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Hi Pedro, good to hear from you. Whenever I meet anyone from Brazil, I ask them about jabuticaba, and they always speak about it as something that’s very close to their heart. And I can see why – it’s such a great fruit.
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