We live in Florida where fruit trees are everywhere. In fact, people often get so much fruit from them that you can see beautiful oranges, grapes fruits, lemons, etc. dying on tree branches in their owners yard. We have three orange trees in our back yard that for some reason haven’t produced any oranges this year but they did last year (see- Waking Up to Cold Florida Air and Oranges).

My Mother was actually the one to point out that she has the huge Loquat tree you see in the picture above in her front lawn. Every year as kids we would pick some to eat and some to throw at each other but we never really ate a substantial amount of them. This year, my mother decided that she was going to try to learn more about them. She found out that they are also called Japanese Plums and that they are jam packed full of vitamins and minerals. She has been faithfully giving us bags full of them every since.

It occurred to me that especially since I am trying to eat healthy I like to keep small fruits like grapes and cherries in the house to snack on which can also be expensive. Why don’t I just eat Loquats instead? They are just as healthy, they are free and they are also going to waste. Waste not, want not. It’s never too late to start taking advantage of an overlooked resource.