More Tropical Fruits from Vietnam: the Rose Apple (or Water Apple)

When we toured the orchards of the Mekong Delta, I discovered this amazing fruit tree that had flower buds, flowers, fruit buds, unripe fruits and ripe fruits on the tree, all at the same time!

A comment on one of my photos of the Rose Apple stated, ‘childhood fruit memories…’, and another ‘it’s crispy and juicy! Yum!!’. This makes me disappointed that I never got around to tasting it, even though it was for sale all over the place.

Not the most glamorous photo but interesting to me, especially since I grew up on an orchard in Canada.
Rose apple tree growing in the Mekong Delta The spiky ‘rose apple’ flower growing in an orchard in the Mekong Delta. 
Roseapple flower growing in orchard in the Mekong DeltaSome blushing green rose apples and some ‘rose’-coloured ones in the orchard.
Rose apples growing on a tree on an orchard along the Mekong River Roseapple growing in orchard by the MekongThere might be two different types of ripe rose apples – I’ve seen both these green/white ones along with the ‘rose’-coloured ones in the market.Rose-apple fruit for sale in Bangkok Rose Apples for sale in a Vietnamese market I chose ‘Rose Apple‘ as the English name for this fruit simply because it was the name I liked best. It has a lot of other names, and grows in a lot of other countries.
More about the tropical fruits of South East Asia:

Gac, a spiky red fruit growing on a vine in the Mekong River Delta of Vietnam

Durians Growing on a Tree in the Mekong Delta of Vietnam

Candied Kumquat from our Cooking Class in Hoi An More about our 2013 trip to Vietnam.

28 responses to “More Tropical Fruits from Vietnam: the Rose Apple (or Water Apple)

    • I’m not entirely sure why the bags are there but having grown up in an orchard I assume they are most likely trying to protect the fruits from being pecked by birds or chewed on by insects. There was no smell of insecticide anywhere in the region and with organic growing methods insect damage is often a problem.

  1. We too have this fruit, we call it star apple, there are white and pink varieties. We have a tree in our garden of the white one and it is flowering:) Regards.

    • Star apple is a lovely name too – thank you for letting me know that there were two different varieties – do they taste different? I know that there is huge differences in flavour between regular red and green apples.

  2. Here, the red ones have a slight sour taste, but the white ones are sweet. Within a month the fruits will be ripe and when the weather is hot it is nice to eat these juicy fruits:)

  3. Pingback: Luncheon on the Mekong River in Vietnam | Albatz Travel Adventures·

  4. Pingback: CFFC: Apple Red Colour | Albatz Travel Adventures·

Leave a comment