BANANAS, PINEAPPLES AND OTHER FRUITS
The banana is of East Indian origin, but of an antiquity so great that
man has no record of its appearance on earth as an edible fruit, nor can
any variety of the plant be found today growing wild. The importance of
the banana as a source of food for the human race in all warm countries
of low altitude is probably equaled by no other plant, owing to the fact
that a greater amount of nourishment can be secured from an acre of
bananas than from any other product of the soil.
The banana has accompanied man into all parts of the tropical world, and
for the natives at least still remains the one unfailing staff of life.
The bulb once placed in moist fertile earth will continue to propagate
itself and to produce fruit indefinitely, even without care of any kind,
although for commercial purposes it may be improved and its
productiveness increased through selection and cultivation.
Few if any plants that nature has given us can be utilized in so many
ways as the banana. The fruit when green, and before the development of
its saccharine matter takes place, consists largely of starch and
gluten, furnishing a splendid substitute, either boiled or baked, for
the potato. Cut into thin slices, and fried in hot oil or lard, it
becomes quite as palatable as the Saratoga chips of the United States.
When baked in an oven and mashed with butter or sauce, it is not a bad
substitute for the potato, and far more nourishing.
When sun-dried and finely ground, a splendid highly nutritious
banana-flour is produced, that is not only pleasant to the taste, but
according to the report of physicians far more easily digested and
assimilated than is the flour of wheat or corn. From good banana flour,
either bread, crackers, griddle cakes or fancy pastry may be made, that
would be relished on any table.
The green fruit, when cut into small cubes, toasted and mixed with a
little mocha coffee to give it flavor, offers the best substitute for
that beverage that has been found up to the present time. When
scientifically treated with sugar, the semi-ripe fruit with the addition
of flavoring extracts may be converted into very good imitations of
dried figs, prunes and others forms of preserves, that are not only
healthful and palatable, but are nutritious, and may well serve as an
important contribution to the food products of the world.
Interesting and important experiments with banana-flour and the various
products of both the ripe and the green fruit were made in Camaguey some
years ago. The results were exceedingly satisfactory, but with the death
of the inventor this promising industry was permitted to drop into
disuse. Had Cuba been able to command the use of, or fall back on this
splendid substitute for wheat flour, there would have been no bread
famine in the island, such as occurred in the spring of 1918, and the
Republic would have been independent of outside assistance.
Bananas for commercial purposes, or rather for export, have been grown
for many years in the eastern end of the Island, especially in the
neighborhood of Nipe Bay, where deep, rich soil, combined with the heavy
rainfall of summer, results in rapid growth and full development of the
fruit. The banana grown for shipment to the United States is known in
Cuba as the Johnson. There are several types of this, but all resemble
closely the bananas of Costa Rica and other Central American countries,
where the United Fruit Company controls the trade. Owing to the fact
that this Company owns its own groves in Central America, conveniently
located for loading its ships, the United States is supplied today
almost entirely from that section, and the exportation of bananas from
Cuba has been materially reduced.
Banana lands, too, are almost invariably well adapted to the growing of
sugar cane, hence the great fields of Nipe Bay, and that part of Oriente
once devoted to the cultivation of bananas, were eagerly sought by the
sugar companies of the Island, and most of the territory converted into
big sugar cane plantations.
There are probably twenty varieties of bananas cultivated in different
parts of Cuba. Some twelve or more of these may be seen growing at the
Experimental Station at Santiago de las Vegas. The variety preferred for
local consumption and always in constant demand is the large cooking
bananas, known in the United States as the plantain. This banana is not
eaten in its natural state, but when cooked, either green or ripe, it
finds a place on every table in Cuba.
The plant is tall and the fruit at least twice as long as that of the
ordinary banana of commerce. It is not as prolific as other varieties,
seldom bearing more than 30 or 40 to the stem, but it is found on every
farm on the Island and is relied on as a source of food, even more than
is the potato. The bunches under normal conditions command in the market
prices varying from 20¢ to 60¢, dependent upon the number of “hands” or
bananas to the stalk.
The banana plant reaches a height of twelve or fifteen feet and is
reproduced from the sucker or offshoot of the original bulb. About 400
hills are set out to the acre. In twelve months the first comes to
maturity, producing a single bunch of fruit, whose price, dependent on
variety and size, varied from 20¢ to $1. Each main stalk during the year
sends up six or eight suckers, that are used to increase the acreage as
desired. Bananas for export are grown profitably only on or near the
edge of deep water harbors, where transportation to northern markets is
assured.
A description of all of the many varieties of the banana grown in Cuba
would be perhaps superfluous. The most commonly cultivated for the
table, and eaten without cooking, is known as the Manzana or Apple
Banana. Its flavor may suggest the apple, although the choice of name is
probably accidental. The bunch is rather small, and the fruit is bright
yellow, only about one-half the length of the banana of commerce, and
stands out more or less horizontally from the stem on which it grows.
The average price of these when found in the market is about 35¢ per
bunch.
Some three or four varieties of the red banana are grown in Cuba, and
while quite hardy and easily cultivated they are not prized in the
Indies as in the United States. The dwarf banana, or Platano Enano, has
a very pleasant flavor, not unlike that of the Johnson, or banana of
commerce, and may be found in almost every garden in the Island. The
plant reaches a height of only five or six feet, and the bunches of
fruit are long and heavy, filled almost to the tip, and often supported
by a forked stock, caught under the neck of the stalk so that the weight
of the fruit will not break or pull over the plant itself.
Another very choice banana is called the “Platano Datil,” or date
banana. The stalks are relatively small and hold but little fruit in
comparison with other varieties, seldom having more than two or three
hands to the bunch. The fruit itself is from two and a half to three
inches in length, round and plump, with a thin skin that can be slipped
off, like a glove, but with a flavor that is probably the most delicate
and delicious of the whole Musa family.
Approximately 125,000,000 pounds of bananas are exported from the Island
each year, valued under normal conditions at a little over a million
dollars. The great bulk of bananas grown in Cuba are for domestic
consumption.
Agriculture, although rapidly assuming as it should the dignity of a
science, still has its caprices or apparent contradictions. And so it
happens that the choicest flavored and highest priced bananas of the
world are grown in the waterworn pockets of almost barren dog-teethed
rocks--“los dientes de perro” of the extreme eastern end of Cuba, just
back of Cape Maysi.
Here the coast rises from sea level in a series of four or five steps or
comparatively flat plateaux, each some four or five hundred feet above
the other, until an altitude of two thousand feet is reached. The rocks
are soft limestone and in the millions of waterworn pockets, the leaves
and dust of the forest jungle have left their deposit for ages. In this
shallow soil bananas not only grow luxuriously but have a remarkably
delicate and delicious flavor, essentially their own.
The secret of this wondrous growth and par excellence however, lies not
alone in the rocky soil, but in the fact that generous nature at this
point, contributes an abundant shower of rain almost every day in the
year. The low, heavily waterladen clouds of the West Indian seas, driven
by easterly winds strike this series of table lands, one rising above
the other, and shower the lands with daily rains. Hence it is that while
the average rainfall of Cuba is 54 inches, this series of table land of
Cape Maysi has an annual rainfall of 125 inches.
The result is that in spite of difficult access and a cultivation
confined to the hoe, millions of bunches of choice bananas are grown and
shipped from the mouth of the Little Yumuri every year. United Fruit
steamers on their way north from South and Central American banana
fields stop at the above landing to take on a top dressing of fancy
fruit.
Owing to the fact that the banana has practically no season, or rather
that it may bear in any month, four suckers of varying ages are set out
in each hill, from which four bunches of fruit, some three months apart,
will result during the year. With four hundred stands or hills to the
acre, the annual yield should be, approximately 1,600 bunches, and
whether the crop is disposed of in the local markets or converted into
banana flour, the growing of bananas may be made one of the important
industries of Cuba.
Patient toil and judicious selection have made the modern pineapple one
of our most delightful of all fruits, in addition to which, in those
countries not too far removed from markets, it has assumed an important
place as a commercial industry. The fruit of the pineapple, like that of
the strawberry, is a strange compound or consolidation of hundreds of
little fruits, in one symmetrical cone, tinted when ripe with shades
varying from greenish yellow to golden red or orange. Like the
strawberry, it is a ground fruit that must be planted and cultivated
along the lines that bring best results with ordinary field crops.
Pineapples have been grown in Cuba since the beginning of the Spanish
occupation, perhaps even before, although no mention is made of them as
being cultivated by the Indians. As a commercial product the growing of
the pineapple on a large scale began during the first Government of
Intervention, although they were shipped abroad to some extent before
that time. In point of money value, the industry ranks next to that of
the citrus fruit. Although up to the present time most of the pineapples
intended for export are grown within fifty miles of the city of Havana,
over a million crates are annually shipped to the United States.
Pineapples may be grown on any rich soil in Cuba, and are considered one
of the staple crops. The slips or offshoots from the parent plant are
set out in long ridges some four feet apart, with intervening spaces
averaging a foot. These produce fruit in one year from planting, and
from each original stalk an average of six suckers may be taken for
planting in other beds, so that with a very small start the acreage may
be easily increased five or six-fold each year.
About 8,000 plants are considered sufficient for an acre of ground; and
the cost of them when purchased averages about $30 per acre, while the
preparation of the land for pineapple culture will amount to somewhat
more. The net returns under favorable circumstances will vary from $75
to $100. The average net profit from pineapples grown near Artemisia and
Campo Florida is said to be about $50 per acre. The high price of sugar,
since the beginning of the European War, has, however, caused much of
the former pineapple acreage to be converted into cane fields.
The profit derived from pineapple culture, as in all fruits or
vegetables of a perishable nature, depends very largely upon the
shipping facilities of the locality selected. Pineapples cannot long be
held on the wharf waiting for either trains or steamers. In this
connection it may be mentioned that the daily ferry between Key West and
Havana, by which freight cars can be loaded in the fields and shipped to
any city in the United States without breaking bulk, has been very
beneficial to growers.
The Red Spanish, owing to its excellent shipping qualities, is preferred
to all others for export, although many other varieties, such as the
“Pina blanca” or sugarloaf, which will not stand shipment abroad, are
used for local consumption and bring an average price of ten cents
retail throughout the year.
The largest pines grown for commercial purposes include the Smooth
Cayenne, a beautiful fruit, varying in weight from five to fifteen
pounds. Unfortunate is he who may have partaken of the rich sweet, juicy
Sugar Loaf of Cuba, since it will discourage his fondness for the Smooth
Cayenne, the much advertised Honolulu and other cone shaped products,
whose flavor is not in keeping with their appearance.
So delicious in flavor is the sugar loaf pine in comparison with those
large varieties suited only for canning or cooking purposes, that the
latter have never become sufficiently popular in Cuba to induce
cultivation. In the Isle of Pines, however, as well as in Florida, the
smooth Cayenne is grown and shipped to the nondiscriminating who live
abroad. With care in packing, however, the sugarloaf may reach northern
markets.
The pineapple more than any other fruit appeals to the canning industry,
especially in Cuba, where hundreds of thousands that have ripened too
late for the northern markets are left to rot in the fields. There are
no better pineapples grown in the world than in the Island of Cuba, and
the excess or overproduction of the fruit within the next few years will
undoubtedly be handled by properly equipped canning factories and thus
add another industry to the revenues of the Island.
The Anon is a small shapely tree seldom growing over twenty feet in
height and common throughout all Cuba. The fruit of the Anon, sometimes
called the sugar-apple, resembles a small round greenish white cone,
about the size of the ordinary apple. Its delightful pulp suggests a
mixture of thick sweetened cream, adhering to smooth black sunflower
seeds. Although delicious to eat fresh from the tree, and very useful in
making ices, it does not readily endure shipment, and is thus confined
commercially to the local markets of the larger cities in Cuba.
The Chirimoya, belonging to the same family, is undoubtedly the queen of
the Anones. It is larger than the Anon, reaching the size of an ordinary
grape-fruit. Its pulp is white, soft and very delicate, while the skin,
unlike the Anon, is smooth, yellowish in color, with a blush of red.
The Zapote, Nispero or Sapodilla, as it is variously termed, is a
beautiful ornamental tree of the forest, indigenous to tropical America
and the West Indies. The tree, with its trim shapely trunk and branches,
its crisp, dark green foliage that never fails, adds greatly to the
beauty of parks and lawns. The wood is hard, reddish and very durable.
From the trunk exudes chicle gum, used in the United States for making
chewing-gum. In England, since it is more plastic than caoutchouc, and
more elastic than gutta-percha, it is employed as an adulterant to these
products. The fruit in size and color resembles somewhat a small russet
apple. It has a delightfully sweet juicy pulp, not unlike a persimmon
touched with frost. The small glossy seeds are easily removed, and the
fruit is very refreshing when left on ice, or in the early morning
hours. Only with extreme care in packing could zapotes, like many other
fruits of Cuba, stand shipment to foreign countries.
The Tamarind is a tall, beautiful tree frequently 70 to 80 feet in
height, with a soft, delicate, locust-like foliage, and purplish or
orange veined flowers in terminal clusters. The Tamarind probably
originated in Abyssinia or some other part of eastern tropical Africa,
but at the present time it is scattered throughout the entire tropical
world, and is very common in Cuba. There is perhaps no tree known whose
fruit furnishes a more refreshing fruit than the Tamarind. It is said to
have been brought to Cuba from Southern Europe more than a century ago,
whence it has since been scattered throughout the forest, through the
medium of birds. From its branches, after the flowers have disappeared,
hang clusters of brown colored, bean-like brittle pods. These when ripe
are filled with a sweet yet pleasantly acid pulp, which when mixed with
water makes a refreshing, slightly laxative and healthful drink.
The Mamey Colorado is another giant tree of the forest, belonging to the
Sapodilla family and indigenous to tropical America. Its fruit is oval
in form, some six or eight inches in length, covered with a tough brown
skin, and filled with a rich peculiar dark red pulp, inclosing a long,
smooth, coffee-colored seed, that is easily separated from the edible
part of the fruit. In consistency and flavor, it suggests slightly a
well-made pumpkin pie. Those unaccustomed to the fruit would probably
find it unpleasantly rich. The yellow or Mamey de Santo Domingo is a
true Mamey, entirely different from the Mamey Colorado. The tree is
large, tall and quite common in the forests of the Island. Its fruit is
round, russet yellow in color and equivalent to a large grapefruit. It
is used only as a preserve, and in that capacity serves a useful
purpose.
The Guava, or Guayaba, as it is known in Spanish countries, springs up
unwanted in almost every field of Cuba. Its nature is that of a shrub,
spreading out with little form or symmetry. If permitted to propagate
itself, it soon becomes a pest difficult to eradicate. A few choice
varieties, one of which is known as the Pear Guava, imported from Peru,
are very palatable. The meat of the latter is white, rather juicy and
free from seeds. The common Guayaba of the field, while sometimes eaten
raw, is always in demand for jellies, Guayaba paste and marmalades,
which have a ready sale in Cuba and in the United States and are very
popular in the latter country. Animals of all kinds, especially pigs and
horses, are very fond of it.
The Mamoncillo is another beautiful forest tree indigenous to Cuba, that
spreads out like a giant live-oak or mammoth apple tree. Its round,
russet green fruit hangs from every branch, and is refreshing to the
traveler who stops a moment beneath its shade. Its slightly acid pulp
covers a rather large round seed, the whole resembling a tough skinned
plum, although the tree belongs to an entirely distinct family.
Figs of all varieties, green, black and yellow, may be found in almost
every garden in Cuba. No effort has been made to preserve them for
commercial purposes, but when ripe they are very refreshing taken with
“desayuno” or the early morning meal.
The Aguacate is another valuable product of the Caribbean Basin, and
seems to be indigenous to nearly all its shores, including Mexico and
Central and South America. It extended south along the Pacific Coast
also, as far as Peru, where the Spanish conquerors found it in use among
the people of the Incas. Oviedo, in his reports to Charles I of Spain in
1526, stated that he had found this peculiar fruit on the Caribbean
shores of both South and Central America.
It was also indigenous to Mexico, where the Aztecs called it the
Ahuacatl, whence came the Spanish name of Aguacate, by which it is known
in Cuba. The name Avocado has been adopted by the Department of
Agriculture of the United States, in order to avoid the confusion
resulting from the many local names under which this fruit is known in
various countries.
The aguacate of Cuba is a tall handsome tree of the forest, scattered
more or less throughout all portions of the Island. It frequently
reaches a height of 70 or 80 feet, and although of an open spreading
nature, nevertheless furnishes grateful shade. There are many types,
although systematic efforts to classify them botanically have not been
very successful. The distinction between them usually made is dependent
largely upon the shape of the fruit or its color.
The most common variety in Cuba is probably the long, pear-shaped
aguacate, although trees bearing round and oblong fruit are often met,
especially where they have been planted in gardens or orchards. In color
the fruit is usually bright green, or greenish red. Some types again
will vary from greenish red to a reddish purple.
The pear shaped aguacates vary in length from five to ten inches, and
will average probably a pound and a half in weight. The round or oblong
types are usually green in color, with a diameter of five or six inches.
The skin is about 1/16th of an inch in thickness, smooth and bright, and
peels freely from the inclosed meat. The meat is rather difficult to
describe since it resembles in flavor and texture no other edible fruit
known. Its color is golden yellow, resembling both in consistency and
shade, rich, cold butter, and is used sometimes as a substitute for this
product of the dairy. Close to the skin the meat has a slightly greenish
tinge. It is very rich in oil and has a pleasant nutty flavor, that
evades all description.
The aguacate may be eaten just as it comes from its thin shell-like
covering. In the center of the fruit is a large hard seed some two and a
half inches in diameter. This never adheres to the pulp, and may be
lifted out readily so that the fruit can be eaten with a spoon.
The aguacate forms the finest salad in the world. When used for this
purpose the pocket from which the seed was removed is usually filled
with broken ice, over which is poured a dressing of salt, vinegar and
mustard or pepper, as fancy may happen to dictate. When filled with
small cubes of sugar loaf pineapple and mayonnaise dressing, you have a
“salad divine.” When taken this way, the aguacate is cut in half, the
shell-like covering forming the bowl from which it is eaten. Owing to
its content of oil, and other nutritious elements, the aguacate will
probably go further towards sustaining life and producing energy than
any other fruit known. It is also excellent when removed from the peel,
cut into cubes and eaten in soup.
The tree is a prolific bearer, the fruit ripening during the months of
July to October inclusive. Other varieties recently introduced come into
bearing in October and remain in fruit until January, some occasionally
holding over until the month of March.
In the development and improvement of the aguacate, it is the aim of the
horticulturist to lengthen the bearing period as much as possible, and
through selection to eliminate any space between the pulp and the seed;
for the latter, if loose, will often bruise the fruit in handling and
shipping. Since the aguacate, like most fruit trees, is not true to
seed, this work can be accomplished only through grafting, and although
successful, requires care and experience. The ordinary aguacate of the
forest bears the fourth or fifth year from the seed, while the grafted
varieties will bear the third year. A tree of the latter type, when five
years of age, will bear from one hundred to five hundred aguacates, that
will average two pounds in weight, and will sell in the fruit markets
of the United States at from $1 to $3 a dozen.
The tree may be grown on any well drained land and under conditions
similar to those of the mango. On hillsides that have sufficient depth
of soil, it does very well, and as the demand for fancy fruit in the
palatial hotels of the United States increases, the growing of aguacates
for commercial purposes will undoubtedly be undertaken in Cuba or a
still larger scale.