Persimmon Mousse

Persimmon Mousse OK, here’s the answer of the pop quiz. The fruit was persimmon. I bought 2 of them at the Sunday market last weekend and wanted to make a dessert out of them. I guess they are Fuyu persimmons. (BTW, the dark-colored cloth underneath is actually my grandmother's Hanten jacket.) What we commonly say about persimmons as a rule of thumb here is: The flatter ones are sweet, acorn-shaped ones are bitter. The sweet (non-astringent) kind persimmons like the Fuyu and CoffeCake shown here taste sweet while they are still firm, so you don’t have to wait until they get really soft. To eat the bitter (astringent) ones, you either wait until they get very ripe and soft, or take the bitterness out by sun-drying or using distilled spirit. I mentioned about eating a bitter persimmon with mayonnaise, but that’s not what we commonly do here in Japan. It was just an interesting finding reported on TV. They said that when you eat a bitter persimmon, it takes away the protein in your mouth and that makes you feel the bitter taste. When eaten with mayonnaise, the mayonnaise supplies the protein to make up for what’s lost and that’s why you don’t feel bitterness. I don’t know if it’s a scientifically proven finding, nor I tried eating one that way myself, but I just remembered the information. Japanese-style I also heard that some people make persimmon tempura. To me that sounds very tempting, so I’ll probably give it a try someday ;)