Durian
Durio zibethinus
A large, spiny, famously odorous tropical fruit. Custard flesh around seeds. Not a temperate crop. Love/hate is olfactory, not a nutrient ranking.
GROW → HARVEST → EAT → DRY → POWDER → CAPSULE → GUMMY — forms are not equivalent. Food first.
Identity
What it is
A large, spiny, famously odorous tropical fruit. Custard flesh around seeds. Not a temperate crop. Love/hate is olfactory, not a nutrient ranking.
Edible portions
- arils
Absence of a portion from this list means it is not treated as food here — not that every other part is toxic.
Growing
- Climate. 10–12 wet tropics
- Light. Full sun, humid, no frost
- Soil. Deep, well-drained tropical
- Planting. Not a U.S. backyard fruit except far south experiments.
- Harvest. When fruit drops or stems loosen, cultivar-dependent.
Preparation and culinary uses
- Fresh, sticky rice pairing — polarizing
Nutrition and compounds
- Vitamins (qualitative, well-known associations). energy-dense fruit — fat-containing, unusual among fruits — not milligram values.
AAA interpretation Food first. These associations explain why a plant shows up in a nutrient conversation — they are not a supplement shopping list.
Next steps
Sources
- USDA PLANTS Database — taxonomy and range (verify current entries)
- USDA FoodData Central — nutrient profiles for foods (verify current entries; this page does not invent milligrams)
- State cooperative extension growing guides — verify for your region
Honest incompleteness is preferred to fabricated completeness. If a section is missing, no record for it is attached here — not a claim that the plant lacks that characteristic, and not that it was omitted as a secret.
Internal quality class A. Strong page: distinctive plant facts plus practical growing or kitchen use.