To All,
The three classic melons that are readily available and widely eaten are the watermelon, cantaloupe, and honeydew melon. Those who yearn for a more varied melon experience will ask what additional melons are available. To answer this question, I have surveyed the off-brand melons at Whole Foods and selected three to try. All are in what is called the gourd or cucumber family.
Canary Melon
A canary melon is slightly larger than a cantaloupe, oval rather than round, and bright yellow, which is the source of its name. My melon weighed 4 pounds and cost $0.99 per pound.
I cut the melon into halves, quarters, and eighths. Working with an eighth, it was very easy to cut out the seeds in the middle. For eating, I then cut it into sixteenths. I cut the rind off of a sixteenth and ate it. The immediate impression was that the taste is almost exactly that of a cantaloupe, though not quite as strong. Compared to a cantaloupe, its meat was a little softer and easier to deal with; it was very quick and easy to remove the seeds and the rind. The experts say that an advantage of the canary melon is that you can eat the rind, which is only about a sixteenth of an inch thick. I gave it a try with the next sixteenth but found that the rind was too tough. In fact, it is so tough that you don't need to cut it off. You can just scrape the meat off with your teeth if you like it that way; the meat is good all the way down to the rind, and the boundary between meat and rind is unmistakeable. Being fastidious, I preferred to cut off the rind. A quarter of the melon went down very easily in one sitting, even though I was pretty full from having just had lunch. The pictures below show the melon on my cutting board in various states: (1) whole, (2) halves, (3) half, quarter, eighth, and two sixteenths with the seeds removed, (4) and half, quarter, and the rind from four sixteenths that have just been eaten. A tip is missing from one segment where I bit off the tip and tried to chew it.
The verdict: The canary melon really is only a slight variation on a cantaloupe. Differences are that it is larger, has a more striking appearance, is a little easier to cut up, and is a little more expensive. You might want a canary melon as a occasional change of pace, but there is no reason for it to replace the cantaloupe as your workhorse melon, unless you find the taste of a cantaloupe to be too pungent. Another consideration is that the Internet experts find it hard to tell when the canary melon is ripe. Mine by chance turned out to be perfectly ripe, but the difficulty in ascertaining ripeness could be a reason to avoid this melon.
Santa Claus or Christmas Melon
This melon has almost the same proportions as a football, though it is somewhat smaller; mine is eight inches long. It is colored much like a watermelon but is blotchier. There are many conjectures as to the origin of the name. Some say that it comes from the fact that it keeps a long time, e.g., until Christmas. Others say the name comes from imports from South America showing up in the stores around Christmas. This melon originated in Spain; it is the melon of La Mancha. My melon weighted 2.8 pounds and cost $0.99 per pound.
I put my melon on my cutting board and poised my knife, ready to slice it in half. The name of the melon felt appropriate since I felt like I was about to open a Christmas present; I couldn't wait to see what was inside. I cut it in two and found that the meat had the color of a honeydew melon. I cut it into quarters since I view a quarter as being a serving. I cut one of the quarters into eighths and then sixteenths, and these four sixteenths served as today's dessert.
The pictures below show the Christmas melon in various stages on my cutting board, with a Parker T-ball Jotter for scale.
- The entire melon, showing the green side. This is how pictures invariably show this melon.
- The entire melon, showing the unpublicized yellow side, which is the side that rests on the ground when the melon is on the vine. That the side that the sun cannot get to loses its green color leads me to the conjecture that the skin of the melon is photosynthetic.
- The melon cut in halves, exposing its inner color and seeds, which are gathered in the middle rather than spread throughout as in a watermelon.
- The melon in quarters with the seeds removed. I found that when in quarters it was easy to scoop the seeds out with a big spoon.
- Three quarters along with four sixteenths with the rind removed. Once in sixteenths, it was easy to pare the rind off with a steak knife.
Now for the taste test. I lifted a segment of melon to my mouth and took a big bite. As for texture, while the melon looks like a honeydew melon, it is much softer, though not quite as soft as the canary melon. As for taste, it had a mild watermelon taste. Beyond taste, the smooth texture of a melon makes it a very soothing food. As it turned out, my melon was completely ripe.
The verdict: The Santa Claus melon is easy to cut and prepare, and it has a pleasing watermelon taste. Unlike the watermelon, its seeds are gathered all in once place. This can be an advantage if you like your seeds easy to deal with or a disadvantage if you like to roast the seeds or play spitting games with them. Like the canary melon, the price was $0.99 per pound, which is more expensive than standard watermelons per pound; it is, however, cheaper than the mini-watermelons that I saw this week at Trader Joe's.
Horned Melon or Kiwano
The horned melon is slightly larger than a pear and is yellow with thorn-like protrusions that make it look more like a sea creature than a fruit. The thorns are surprisingly sharp; be careful when you wash it or you'll hurt your hands. This melon originated in the Kalahari Desert in southern Africa. I once saw a documentary about the Bushmen of the Kalahari; this convinced me that you have to be a hardy and aggressive organism to survive in this harsh environment. My horned melon cost a flat $5.99 at Whole foods.
I went to http://www.wikihow.com/Eat-a-Kiwano-(Horned-Melon) to learn how to eat this formidable fruit. I started by cutting it in half. If by now you are jaded and think you know what you're going to get when you cut open a melon, then this melon will make you reconsider the nature of reality and question the predictability of the world. The inside of the melon is stuffed with a goopy, emerald green mixture of seeds and slime, which explains this fruit's alternate name of jelly melon. The Internet experts say that you can eat this fruit either by squeezing on a half and sucking up the fruit as it is extruded, or you can scoop it into a bowl.
I took one of the halves, stood over the sink to guard against a mess, put my mouth to the open half, and squeezed. Nothing happened. I squeezed harder. Still nothing. I then gave it a mighty weightlifter squeeze, and the fruit exploded and shot slime all over my glasses and into my hair. Too bad there was no video. Not stopping to clean up, I put my mouth back on the melon and squeezed gently. Now that the structural integrity of the melon had been compromised, it was easy to squeeze a little bit at a time into my mouth, and I finished this half without further incident. For the second half, I scooped the fruit into a bowl and was able to eat it in a civilized way. Clearly, scraping the slime out is the way to eat this fruit, and the Internet experts are playing a practical joke on the hoi polloi when then tell you to squeeze it into your mouth.
The slime and seeds mixture had a pleasing texture, very much like passion fruit. The taste was very mild. So mild, in fact, that you barely know you are eating anything. You would expect a fruit native to the Kalahari to pack more punch. The seeds did not present a problem.
The pictures below show the entire fruit, the two halves of the freshly cut fruit, and the two emptied halves with the fruit from one of the halves in a bowl. You can see that this fruit has an impressive number of seeds. I scraped out the empty halves and dried them; I will be looking for ways to put them to use, perhaps as goblets to be used for ceremonial toasts.
The verdict: This fruit has unmistakable visual appeal and it's fun to play with, but it offers little in the way of taste. Since this fruit was a budget buster at $5.99, it's hard to justify its purchase unless it's going to be the centerpiece in an art work.
Here's your party tip: Issue each guest a garbage bag with holes punched in it so they can wear it as a raincoat. Also give each guests a shower cap from the stock that you have brought back from stays at hotels. Finally, give each guest half of a horned melon. Before you know it, you will hear squeals of glee as a horned melon fight breaks out and your guests squirt each other with green slime. There is no need to intervene as each guest will quickly exhaust the ammo in the melon half. When they leave, you will hear them chuckling and saying how they can't remember when they had so much fun. As a final touch, give a scraped-out horned melon half to each guest, saying that it is a shot glass. Later, when your guests do shots, they will reminisce about your party and the only time in their lives when they were allowed to play a green version of paintball.
The Fruit Explorer
Party Tip
Your party tip is to purchase a mix of melons. Before the party, cut each melon in half and scoop out the meat, which you will serve to your guests. Save the hollowed-out halves. After the guests finish their melons, cover your table with newspaper, lay tempra paints and paintbrushes on the table, and give each guest the dome-like rind from half a melon. Instruct your guests to paint a scene from "The Wizard of Oz" on their melon halves. When all are painted, arrange them on the table in chronological order and, still enamored with your new digital camera, take a picture of this precis of "The Wizard of Oz" with the artists in the background. This picture will provide your guests with a lasting memory of your party. Taking advantage of the fact that collectors pay big bucks for Oz memorabilia, the final touch is to auction off the painted peels for the benefit of your local orphanage. Not only will the orphans shower you with hosannas, but your guests will forever have a warm feeling about your party because it gave them an opportunity to help the less fortunate.
