By TJ Nagel
ISA Board Certified Master Arborist®
November 7, 2024
When it comes to trees, I’ve got lots of favorites. I have a favorite deciduous tree - the Persian parrotia. My favorite evergreen tree is the lacebark pine. My favorite tree for fall color is the black tupelo. I even have a favorite smelling tree - the concolor fir (I love that the crushed needles smell like oranges). Today, I’m writing about my favorite native, edible fruit tree, the pawpaw! Keep reading if you like pie.
A pawpaw tree (Asimina triloba) in the fall!
If you’re not hip to pawpaws already, the next paragraph is required reading. If you have pawpaw trees in your landscape currently, have ever attended the Ohio Pawpaw Festival, have a pawpaw cookbook, own an article of clothing with a pawpaw printed on it, or have a pawpaw bumper sticker on your car, you can jump ahead to the pie.
Pawpaw (Asimina triloba), sometimes called custard apple, is a hardy and adaptable small tree, generally growing 15 - 25’ in height in the landscape, with a dense pyramidal shaped canopy (when grown in full sun). The leaves hang downward at an angle and give the tree a somewhat tropical appearance. The fall color of the leaves is a nice golden yellow. Maroon to purple flowers come out mid-spring and are pollinated by flies. Interesting side note: Some of the old timers I know hang meat in their pawpaw trees at the time of flowering to increase pollination as the meat attracts more flies. Pawpaw flowers give way to small fruits, 3 - 6” in length that somewhat resemble a banana and often form in clumps of 3 to 5. Depending on the tree, the fruit can ripen anywhere between late August and early October. Additional side notes: The pawpaw fruit is the largest fruit native to North America and the pawpaw tree is the host plant for the caterpillar of the zebra swallowtail butterfly. Good stuff!
Pawpaw fruit! Quarter for scale.
Pawpaw fruit is one of my favorite things to look forward to every year (up there with spring flowers and fall color). The fruit tastes similar to a banana, mango, pear but with more of a custard-like consistency. FYI, the fruit can often contain many large, lima bean-sized seeds, especially with wild picked fruit. The fruit also has a short shelf life, often lasting only a few days after ripening, which is why you don’t see pawpaws at Costco.
Several cultivated varieties of pawpaw exist now that have been selected for longer lasting and larger fruit with less seeds. I personally recommend ‘Prolific,’ ‘Wells,’ and ‘Sweet Alice.’ These cultivated varieties can be difficult to source, but not impossible. Check in with the folks at Dannaher Landscaping in Galena who generally have several different varieties of pawpaw trees on hand. These are good friends of mine.
Collecting wild fruit is also cool and another reason to go out into the woods. In central Ohio, I typically find pawpaw trees growing naturally near the banks of Walnut Creek, Alum Creek, the Scioto River, the Olentangy River, and throughout wooded flood plains where it often develops a more open and leggy appearance. Near my office in Westerville, along the Alum Creek bike path, I have observed several pawpaw trees in excess of 30’ in height with decent fruit production. We’re getting closer to the part about pie.
Dad removing seeds from the pulp of a pawpaw with precision.
I first discovered pawpaw trees by accident while my brother and I were canoeing a multi-day trip down the Scioto River late summer 2006. We kept noticing the fruit reaching out over the river from Columbus to Portsmouth and we decided to bring some back home to our father. We really didn’t know what we had, but Dad figured out they were pawpaws and decided to save the seeds, which started some of our original trees. My brother and I have followed different paths growing up, but we both have become professional ISA Certified Arborists® and I think somehow it started with the power of the pawpaw. Almost pie time.
Since 2006, I have eaten pawpaw every which way. At the risk of sounding like Forrest Gump, I’ve had pawpaw ice cream, pawpaw candy, pawpaw beer, pawpaw bread, pawpaw salsa, deep fried pawpaw on a stick and everything pawpaw in between. Dad even invented the pawtini (a martini with a toothpick holding a slice of frozen pawpaw). Until recently, my preference for pawpaw provisions was just eating the pulp straight out of the skin with a spoon. If I’m feeling fancy, I might even chill the fruit first, cut it in half, and cover it with homemade whipping cream for an excellent dessert.
A couple of years ago a colleague sent me a recipe for pawpaw cream pie and it blew my mind! (Yes, it is now pie time.) I’ve been experimenting with different levels and ingredients ever since and today I present to you my final draft!
T.J.’s Pawpaw Cream Pie Recipe
½ cup of sugar
⅓ cup of flour
3 egg yolks, beaten (save the whites for the meringue topping)
3 egg whites
1 cup of milk
1 cup of heavy cream
1 cup of pureed pawpaw pulp
3 tbsp. of sugar
1 pinch of salt
1 baked 9-inch pastry shell
Optional: ⅓ - ½ cup of chopped walnuts
Start by combining the sugar and flour. Add the beaten egg yolks, milk and cream. Mix well and add the pawpaw pulp and walnuts. The walnuts are not essential to the recipe but add some additional flavor and texture. Cook and stir constantly over a low heat until the mixture thickens. Let cool and then pour mixture into a baked pastry shell and cover with meringue. Make a meringue by beating the 3 left over egg whites stiff with 3 tbsp. of sugar and a pinch of salt. Bake at 350 degrees F for 12 - 15 minutes until meringue is browned.
I also make a true cream pie version of this pie following the same recipe except ditching the 3 egg whites and baking the custard and then adding homemade whipping cream to the top after the filling has cooled. A simple and delicious recipe for whipping cream is to mix a half pint container of heavy whipping cream with ¼ cup of sugar and 1 teaspoon of vanilla.
Both of these versions are outstanding. If you like banana cream pie, you are going to love this recipe. I’m partial to the true cream pie version but full disclosure, most of my taste testing buddies prefer the meringue.
This recipe is a great way to use up several pawpaws at once as I often end up with fruit faster than I can eat it. Pawpaw is an underutilized tree in the landscape and I’m hoping that delicious pie will encourage you to plant one; although fruit production is better with two. Pawpaw is an easy tree to grow (I haven’t killed one yet) and it has no significant insect or disease problems. This tree will grow happily in a wide range of environments and tolerate some of the most challenging sites and conditions. I hope you can find a way to incorporate this great native tree into your landscape and I encourage you to share any pawpaw recipes, experiences or questions you might have with us at the bottom of this article. Look forward to hearing from you!
ADDITIONAL ARBOR ED ARTICLES!
Sincerely,
TJ Nagel I Scheduling Production Manager, Russell Tree Experts
TJ loves trees. He is an avid gardener and plant collector. TJ graduated from The Ohio State University with a B.S. in Agriculture with a major in Landscape Horticulture and minor in Entomology. TJ is an ISA Board Certified Master Arborist and well versed in Plant Pathology. TJ joined Russell Tree Experts in 2012.