Prepare Jackfruit Correctly: The Most Important Tips and Tricks

You can prepare the jackfruit ripe or unripe, depending on what you want to conjure up from it. You can buy the prickly tree fruit from Sri Lanka fresh or canned in this country. It is very suitable as a meat substitute and is therefore very popular in vegetarian and vegan cuisine.

Preparing jackfruit – you should know that

If you want to limit your meat consumption, you can use jackfruit as a good alternative.

• Jackfruit is a tree-growing fruit from Sri Lanka that has thick, prickly skin. It’s quick and easy to make and you can use it fresh or canned.
• Since the jackfruit is a tropical fruit, its ecological balance is correspondingly bad: it mainly grows in India, Bangladesh, and Sri Lanka. Due to the long transport routes to Germany, a lot of CO2 is produced, which is very damaging to the climate. The carbon footprint of jackfruit is correspondingly large.
• When buying prickly fruits, pay attention to organic quality. You can buy the tropical fruit in well-stocked health food stores, in Asian shops, or at weekly markets that specialize in tropical fruits. You can get canned unripe fruit from most supermarkets and drugstores.
• Some local products that do not require long transport routes are also suitable as a good meat substitute for many vegetarian or vegan dishes. Instead of jackfruit, you can also use soy, lupine, and seitan products for your dishes, desserts, and snacks.

How to use the jackfruit

How you like to eat the jackfruit is a matter of taste. Whether raw or matured, canned or fresh: everything is possible!

• If you want to use the exotic fruit as a meat substitute or use it to prepare other hearty recipes, you should use it raw. Under the green skin, the pulp then has a meat-like consistency and tastes quite neutral.
• Eaten straight from the can, the fruit tastes reminiscent of artichokes. Therefore, you can also put the fruit on a pizza or eat it just like that. When cooking, you can use the usual spices that you also use for your dishes. The higher the quality, the better the finished dish tastes.
• The simplest way of preparing the fruit is to use it like chops on a salad: cut the fruit into long pieces and heat high-quality oil in a pan. Add the jackfruit strips and sauté over medium heat. Don’t turn too often.
• Season with good quality salt and pepper. It is better to let them brown a little longer on each side at a lower heat than sear them at a high temperature. Serve with a mixed salad.
• There are many ways to prepare jackfruit. You can find a variety of recipes online in most recipe databases. You can prepare burgers, Indian curries, but also local dishes such as goulash, fricassee and Zurich-style sliced ​​meat with exotic gooseberries.
• Canned jackfruits are pickled in acid. If you do not like the acidity in the food, you can pour the fruit into a colander and wash it thoroughly. You can almost completely remove the lime juice with a baking soda bath: simply dissolve some baking soda in water, soak the jackfruits in it for ten minutes and then wash it off.