Zoë Schlanger: “In Puerto Rico, the word for breadfruit is *panapén*, almost always shortened to *pana*, which is also the word for your close friend, your crew, your people. Breadfruit trees feel like kin there: They are everywhere, their huge lobed leaves splayed over roads and porches like the hands of a benevolent giant.
“Finding a roadside breadfruit tree is like spending a moment in Eden. Our human effort is irrelevant; these trees, remarkable growers and givers, will simply provide. A three-year-old tree can reach 20 feet high. They start making fruit years faster than other tropical fruit trees, such as mango, and can produce 400 pounds or more in a year with little to no human intervention. That fruit is more [calorie- and calcium-dense](https://ntbg.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Breadfruit_NUTRITION.pdf) than a potato, to which its starchy flesh is often compared. It can be steamed, [roasted, or fried](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGdtxQM8TuI), or dehydrated into a useful flour. If allowed to ripen past its hard stage, a breadfruit’s flesh softens into a sweet custard that can be a base for desserts. As aone grower in the Florida Keys, Patrick Garvey, put it to me: ‘One tree feeds a family of four for a lifetime. Or [at least 50 years](https://ntbg.org/breadfruit/about-breadfruit/botany/#:~:text=About%20Breadfruit&text=Without%20studying%20the%20botany%20of,no%20pollination%20to%20produce%20fruit.), per researchers’ findings. And thanks to climate change, this fruit may soon be coming to the southern United States in a major way for the first time.”
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Zoë Schlanger: “In Puerto Rico, the word for breadfruit is *panapén*, almost always shortened to *pana*, which is also the word for your close friend, your crew, your people. Breadfruit trees feel like kin there: They are everywhere, their huge lobed leaves splayed over roads and porches like the hands of a benevolent giant.
“Finding a roadside breadfruit tree is like spending a moment in Eden. Our human effort is irrelevant; these trees, remarkable growers and givers, will simply provide. A three-year-old tree can reach 20 feet high. They start making fruit years faster than other tropical fruit trees, such as mango, and can produce 400 pounds or more in a year with little to no human intervention. That fruit is more [calorie- and calcium-dense](https://ntbg.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Breadfruit_NUTRITION.pdf) than a potato, to which its starchy flesh is often compared. It can be steamed, [roasted, or fried](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IGdtxQM8TuI), or dehydrated into a useful flour. If allowed to ripen past its hard stage, a breadfruit’s flesh softens into a sweet custard that can be a base for desserts. As aone grower in the Florida Keys, Patrick Garvey, put it to me: ‘One tree feeds a family of four for a lifetime. Or [at least 50 years](https://ntbg.org/breadfruit/about-breadfruit/botany/#:~:text=About%20Breadfruit&text=Without%20studying%20the%20botany%20of,no%20pollination%20to%20produce%20fruit.), per researchers’ findings. And thanks to climate change, this fruit may soon be coming to the southern United States in a major way for the first time.”
Read more: [https://theatln.tc/I4nX92OI](https://theatln.tc/I4nX92OI)
I’m gonna plug the Hawaii Breadfruit Co-operative,
[eatbreadfruit.com](https://eatbreadfruit.com)
It can be made in chips.
Gluten free flour. Americans will eat that up.