Ripe loquats are cooked down into a thick and lightly sweetened vegan and gluten free fruit butter. You can leave it plain or add flavorings like ground cinnamon or vanilla!
I’ve always been fascinated by fruit trees. When I was a kid, I used to love sneaking fruit off our neighbor’s loquat tree, running away to enjoy them in the secret of the playhouse in my backyard. It was thrilling, both the sneakiness and the taste of those golden fruits. I remember telling my dad that I regularly pilfered loquats and his straight-faced reply was something along the lines of “well I hope you don’t swallow one of those seeds because if you do, a loquat tree will grow in your belly”. It didn’t stop me from eating them but it sure did make me obsessively remove the seeds from there on out.
We’re currently in the middle of loquat season here in Houston. They’re among the first fruits of the year to come into season not counting all of the lingering citrus fruits that cling to trees in late February and early March. There are several loquat trees along the trail I regularly walk so I’ve been enjoying watching their life cycle from the first blooms in November to the limbs heavy with round, yellow fruits today. Loquats, also called Chinese plums, taste like a mash-up of plums, apricots, and tart cherries. Though the name sounds similar, they are not to be confused with kumquats which are a citrus fruit.
I had a moment of sheer delight when I was gifted a large bag of loquats earlier in the week. It occurred to me, standing there simultaneously snacking on them and spitting the seeds aside, that I had never made anything with loquats. So, I figured a fruit butter was in order! It’s a damn tedious process to remove the seeds but I have a feeling you’ve got some extra time on your hands at home these days.
Loquat Butter
- Total Time: 60-90 minutes
- Yield: dependent on amount of fruit used
- Diet: Vegan
Description
Ripe loquats are cooked down into a thick and lightly sweetened vegan and gluten free fruit butter. You can leave it plain or add flavorings like ground cinnamon or vanilla!
Ingredients
- ripe loquats
- fresh lemon juice
- sugar, honey, or maple syrup to sweeten
- any other flavorings you’d like (cinnamon and ginger are good options but if you want to add vanilla extract, make sure to do it at the end of the cooking process)
Instructions
Rinse your loquats if you haven’t already. Cut off and discard the blossom end and seeds/seed membrane from every loquat. This is the tedious part! You can look at it like a working meditation.
When you’re done processing all of your loquats, add them to a blender with a splash or two of water. Blend the fruit until you get a puree. If the blender doesn’t seem to be blending the fruit easily, add a splash more water.
Measure out your puree then add it to a large pot (you want a large pot because the mixture will sputter as it cooks and this will prevent you and your stove top from being covered in loquat juice). For every cup of puree, you’ll add 2 tsp of fresh lemon juice and 1 tbsp of your sweetener (I used organic cane sugar) to the pot with the puree. For instance, I ended up with 3 cups of puree so I added 6 tsp lemon juice and 3 tbsp sugar. If you’ve decided to use any spices, add those now as well.
Heat the mixture over medium. Cook it over medium, stirring every minute or so, until most of the liquid has cooked out and it has the consistency of thick applesauce. The cooking process ending up taking a total of about 30 minutes for my batch.
Store your loquat butter in a jar in the fridge for up to 2 weeks (or freeze it to save some for later). For reference, I started with 3 cups of loquat puree and ended up with about 1 3/4 cups of butter.
Ways to enjoy your loquat butter: swirled into yogurt or oatmeal, on toast, on sandwiches, on ice cream, baked into breads and muffins in place of pumpkin puree or mashed bananas, dolloped on thumbprint cookies, or dolloped onto a soft chocolate cookie as shown in the photos 😉
Notes
- Fruit butters are essentially low sugar fruit purees that have been cooked down to evaporate a good deal of the moisture and intensify the natural flavors (think apple butter). Luckily loquats are lower in overall moisture and really high in pectin so they don’t take too terribly long to cook up into fruit butter! The recipe is formatted so that you can adjust the amount of sugar and lemon juice based on how much loquat puree you end up with. Feel free to add in any spices or flavorings that you want!
- For every cup of puree, you’ll need 2 tsp of fresh lemon juice and 1 tbsp of sweetener
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Cook Time: 30-60 minutes
- Category: sauce
