Apricots are delicate, velvet-skinned stone fruits that share the same family of plums and peaches. Historically, this stone fruit is known to be an aphrodisiac. Aphrodisiac is food that can stimulate the eros of your body, improving your sex life. But in the later years, apricots gained their reputation as healthy food in dried fruit and juice.
As a fruit, apricot is small and has an average size of two inches in diameter. The velvety skin of apricot has a golden orange in color, with a tinge of red. Like peaches, apricots have a subtle cleavage on one side and a stone seed that is circular. The taste of apricot can vary from one person to another.
Apricot has a juicy bite but not as watery compared to watermelon. This stone fruit has a balanced mixture of the sweet-tart profile, which is milder than a pineapple. Others considered apricot’s flavor as a blessed infusion of peach and plum. Once you’ve split the apricot open, you will find an almond-shaped kernel that can be eaten if prepared properly.
Are Apricots Sweet or Sour?
Apricots are considered a part of the stone fruit family. Stone fruit, also known as a drupe, is a fruit variant with a large seed resembling a stone. Popular variants include dates, lychees, mulberries, nectarines, peaches, coconuts, olives, and mangoes. Stone fruit also has two primary classifications named clingstone and freestone.
Clingstone fruits are variants that contain a single seed that cannot be easily removed from the fruit’s fleshy part. On the other hand, freestones have a larger fleshy area, making the seed part easier to remove. More significant variants tend to have a smaller seed space in apricots, making them easier to remove.
Unlike other drupe fruits, apricots can be generally tart in flavor. While it can be sweet, others find apricots overwhelmingly tart, making them refuse to eat the new variants. That is why restaurants and bakeries devise a way to unleash the apricots’ naturally sweet and sour profile to make them more appealing to its consumers.
Fresh apricots are known for their juicy, fleshy taste. It can be watery, but not too much as watermelons possess. It also has a heavier and thicker taste than nectarines and peaches, made possible by its thick juice. This is why fresh apricots are turned into syrupy liquid and labeled as a form of apricot nectar.
Once dried with other ingredients like salt and sugar, the apricot’s flavor will be doubled while having sufficient sweetness to repel the fruit’s natural tart profile. Dried apricots, together with dates, peaches, and mangoes, gained popularity in the market due to their immense fruity tones with the slight sweet-salty taste in the end.
What Does A Ripe Apricot Taste Like?
When ripe, apricots have a firmer texture than other stone fruit but not crispy compared to apples and pears. It can be bitten easily, but it can have a slight chew on it when consumed fresh. Unripe apricots are hard and firm, similar to green mangoes. However, you cannot consume unripe apricots the same way you do with green mangoes since they can be extremely bitter.
The leading indicator that apricot is ripe enough is by pinching. Once pinched, your finger marks must retain for a few seconds before it regains its original form. If your fingermarks controlled, that means that it is overly ripe and must be harvested immediately. Apricots are also a juicy fruit, enough to release juice without dripping enough.
The juicy consistency of the apricot nectar is responsible for the overall flavor and texture of this fruit. It has a thick, almost-like syrup appearance that can produce an extremely flavor than other fruit. Mixing fresh, ripe apricots to your fruit salad or your breakfast croissant can elevate flavors compared to peaches and plums can offer.
You can also add chopped ripe apricot to your fruit jam since it gives a soft yet sufficient crunch that can add to your food’s overall texture. Another fantastic thing about apricots is that you can eat the whole fruit along with its skin. Apricots have a delicate, velvet skin that is easy to bite through.
If consumed with the skin, apricots can provide a fantastic taste and fiber content. Peeling apricots can also be time-consuming since it has a small size and slippery skin. To remove the skins more effectively, place the apricots in boiling water for 20 seconds. This is enough to peel the skin faster for your cooking needs.
- However, this method is not ideal if you consume the apricots raw since it cooks the flesh, affecting its texture.
What Fruit is Similar to Apricot?
Apricots, peaches, and nectarine have the same fruit family. While some recipes can substitute one fruit for another, this will have a distinct change in your fruit’s flavor profile. Several dishes like green salads might call to have chopped apricots in the recipe. You can replace it with peaches or nectarine of the same amount—but it will make a lot of difference in flavor.
Apricots have an insanely complete tart profile compared to peaches and nectarine. Nectarine possesses a flowery taste and scent, while peaches can have a sweeter taste. To differentiate these fruits, here are some reminders that you might consider:
- Apricots have a smaller size compared to peaches, which is about a quarter size. The skin can be edible and possess the same color and shape as the peach. Apricots have more of a sweet-tart profile, unlike peaches and tangerine. It can be used for salads, sauces, salsa, jams, smoothies, jellies, and fresh.
- Nectarines are genetically identical to peaches. What separates them is the skin color and if the variant has fuzzy skin or not. Nectarines have a more bloody, deep red color and can be flowery in taste than peaches.
- Peaches have soft skin and a color gradient of yellow, orange, and bright red. This fruit can be incredibly juicy and sweet when ripe. Like apricots and nectarines, it can be used on several dishes like smoothies, jellies, salads, sauces, salsa, jams, and fresh.
