Finding a fruit one has been wanting to taste for a while—and that too, in an unexpected place—is always exciting. A while ago, a friend had told me about an “egg fruit” from the southern states of Kerala and Tamil Nadu, but I had not managed to lay my hands on it. It was in Sri Lanka that the fruit found me. While travelling through the Central Province town of Nuwara Eliya, I bought a bag full of the fruits, which the vendor told me were called lavulu in the local language and were highly preferred by monkeys.
The fruits were hard and the vendor told me to wait for a few days before eating them. I curiously cut one of them, and found that the pulp was sticky and full of latex, with one large seed. It ripened after nearly a week, developing a golden-yellow colour and texture that resembled a hard-boiled egg yolk. It also gained a sweet, mild flavour and a fragrance similar to sapota or chikoo. In fact, the egg fruit or Pouteria campechiana belongs to the sapotaceae family. Like the sapota, egg fruit is native to Central America, but is now widely cultivated in tropical and sub-tropical regions.
While in Sri Lanka it is lavulu, in Tamil Nadu the fruit is called manjal sappota or mansal pazham. In a 2020 study published in the journal Plant Archives, researchers found that manjal sappota is one of the 80 plants found in the Kanyakumari Wildlife Sanctuary that tribal communities consume. In Kerala, it is called muttapazham. Its other common names include canistel, zapote amarillo or cupcake fruit.
The fruit is packed with calcium, ascorbic acid, niacin, phosphorus, iron and carotene. Its flesh is rich in carotenoids, which contribute to the yellow colour. Chemical analyses show that the fruit is more nutritious than the “superfood” star fruit, according to a study published in 2016 in the Indian Journal of Traditional Knowledge. While unripe egg fruit can be used as a vegetable, the ripe flesh is used to prepare jams and milkshakes (see recipes). In 2015, China patented a jam recipe comprising canistel, watermelon and blueberries.
The pulp is used to prepare pancakes and cupcakes. To prolong its use, people often dehydrate and store the pulp after it ripens. But the sun-dried pulp can lose its natural flavour, aroma and functional compounds. A study published in the journal Research, Society and Development in 2021 shows that freeze-drying the fruit preserves the colour, nutritive properties and beneficial chemicals such as carotenoids, phenolic acids, polysaccharides and niacin.
In 2024, researchers from the State University of Maringá, Brazil used the pulp to colour ice cream, and found that it had high levels of bioactive compounds and retained a stable colour throughout storage. They concluded that the dehydrated pulp holds significant potential for use as food colouring due to its photostability and nutritive value. This study was published in the Journal of Food Science and Technology.
The fruit is also said to have medicinal properties and is used as a remedy for coronary troubles, liver disorders, epilepsy, skin diseases and ulcers. In traditional Mayan medicine (Maya peoples are an ethnolinguistic group of indigenous communities of Central America), a combination of four plants including egg fruit is used for treating diabetes and pain. The impact this quartet of fruits can have is corroborated in research carried out in Mexico and published in the journal Drug Development Research in 2017.
Earlier in 2014, researchers from Bharathidasan University, Tiruchirappalli, published a study in the Journal of Physiology and Biochemistry on the ability of the fruit to protect the liver of rats that were administered acetaminophen. The drug is used to treat fever and body ache but can adversely affect the liver. Acetaminophen triggered an oxidative stress in the rats’ liver, leading to an increase of marker enzymes in the blood. However, treatment with the egg fruit extract significantly reduced the enzyme levels, suggesting that the fruit can restore the normal functional ability of liver cells. The fruit can also be used to treat anaemia and coronary heart diseases, says the 2020 study published in Plant Archives.
Such evidence of the cansitel’s uses have only been published in the last decade or so. This suggests that the fruit is underresearched and underutilised. Not much is done to understand the uses of the evergreen tree as well, which is grown as an ornamental plant but also has abun-dant latex. Perhaps, interest in the plant will increase in the future.
Ingredients
Ripe egg fruit: 1
Sugar: 1/2 cup
Lemon: 1
Method
Peel the fruit and remove the seed. Mash the pulp and place it in a pan. Cook it with sugar. Take the mixture off the heat and add the juice of one lemon. Enjoy the jam with toast.
Ingredients
Ripe egg fruit: 1 Milk: 1 cup
Cinnamon powder: 1/2 tsp
Cardamom powder: 1/4 tsp
Nutmeg powder: 1/4 tsp
Honey: 2 tbsp
Method
Peel the fruit and remove the seed. Add all the ingredients to the blender, and blend until creamy.
Add more milk, if needed, to bring the mix to the consistency of a milkshake. Pour the milkshake in a glass and enjoy.
Ingredients
Unripe egg fruit: 1.5 cups
Finely chopped onion: 1/2 cup
Minced garlic: 1 tsp
Vegetable stock: 4 cups
Ground pepper: 1/8 tsp
Butter: 1 tbsp
Whipped cream and chives: for garnish
Salt to taste
Method
Melt butter in a saucepan. Add onion and sauté until translucent. Add garlic and cook for another minute. Add the egg fruit, stock, pepper and salt. Cook for 15 minutes, stirring constantly. Garnish with whipped cream and chives.
This was first published in the 16-30 April, 2025 print edition of Down To Earth