As I attended a tasting session in the presidential suite at the Hilton Bogotá Corferias hotel property, sections of a small fresh fruit — which reminded me of a cross between a kumquat and a tangerine — sat in a black dish.
Lulo? What is a Lulo?
“Excuse me. What is this?” I asked one of the members of the staff of the hotel property, pointing at this unfamiliar fruit.
“That fruit is called a lulo”, she responded.
“Lulo?”
Once my answer was confirmed in the affirmative, question marks were once again popping out of my head in different colors, as they did when I first learned of a tree tomato in Nairobi back in 2015 after I had been on safari. I had never heard of the name lulo.
Curious, I took one to sample. Parts of the inside of the fruit was reminiscent of the color of a lime — if you applied a little imagination.
Tasting a Lulo
I then tasted it. My tongue was greeted with a definitively tart flavor with a citrus note that was simultaneously slightly sweet. Like most other citrus fruits, the peel is not edible in its natural state. I actually enjoyed the flavor, as I found it curiously refreshing.
What Is a Lulo — and How Can It Be Used?
Curious, I searched for the term lulo on the Internet and found that it is a nickname for Solanum quitoense, according to this article found at Wikipedia. It is also known as a naranjilla.
Native to countries in northwestern South America, the lulo can be eaten raw on its own; but it is typically used for beverages with and without alcohol…
…but at OKA — which is the restaurant in the Hilton Bogotá Corferias hotel property — the fruit is used in many different types of culinary applications.
Summary
As with the aforementioned tree tomato, this is probably one of those fruits to which I have never paid any attention or was not aware; but I would not be surprised if it is destined to one day eventually become as popular as a kiwi fruit.
Have you ever tried a lulo — or naranjilla, as it is known in Ecuador and Panama? If so, what do you think about it?
All photographs ©2019 by Brian Cohen.
