Jack of all trades
The jackfruit has been hailed for its potential as a very tangible meat substitute.
IT’S rare that you find an unripe fruit that’s delicious to eat. But then everything about jackfruit is different. Its flesh is white, fibrous and neutral in taste, making it great for absorbing spices. If you didn’t know what it was, you’d think you were eating chicken.
Stefan Fak had his first encounter with a jackfruit in Asia. During a meditation seminar he admired the melon-sized yellow fruit with pimples hanging from the trunk of a metre-high tree.
Three hours later it was served to him in a delicious curry. I thought: “Wow, this chicken is really tender,” the entrepreneur recalls.
That’s when his business idea came to him, developing almost all by itself. His service, based in Berlin, supplies urban people who don’t want to eat meat but would still like to experience the taste and consistency of meat.
“The jackfruit is simply ideal for this,” says Fak. After all, meat substitutes are also about consistency. And the Asian jackfruit is a very successful meat substitute.
Taste and texture
In Asia, the jackfruit is mainly eaten as a ripe, sweet fruit. In its unripe form it contains less sweetness and is suitable as a savoury dish. The flesh has a fibrous consistency similar to that of chicken. “It is also completely neutral in taste,” Fak says.
“Fibres and a neutral taste are the perfect prerequisites for imitating meat visually and taste-wise,” explains the businessman. The fibres allow oils, spices and sauces to penetrate optimally. With the special spices of typical meat dishes, many sausage, meat or curry dishes can be cooked and have a similar taste and appearance.
“The highly perceptible fibre structure and the resulting sensory properties distinguish the jackfruit from tofu, seitan and co,” explains food technology professor Beatrice Grossjohann, who is researching the nutritional properties of the jackfruit for Fak’s company Lotao and has already rated it as promising.
“The jackfruit has a low glycaemic load depending on the part of the plant used and the degree of ripeness of the harvested fruit, with a high fibre content and a large
number of beneficial secondary plant substances,” says Grossjohann.
Other attributes
The jackfruit tree is also perennial, can be grown in most environments, is free of allergens and currently there is no genetically modified versions of the fruit. Another advantage is that the fruit and its kernels can be used to make flours that can be used as ingredients in various baked goods. It is conceivable that the jackfruit could also be used for producing cereals.
Why is a German university researcher looking into an Asian fruit? “The world population is growing, at the same time
food is unevenly distributed and not available everywhere. This is also an issue for us,” explains the professor.
And the jackfruit tree can help with the development of new food sources: “With a yield of more than three tonnes of fruit per tree per year, just one of these undemanding trees can feed a family,” Grossjohann calculates.
The processing of the jackfruit as a meat substitute is still in its infancy. For this reason, other approaches are also being pursued in Jackfruit processing: As many jackfruit components as possible should be used in various products - for example as baking additives, chutney, chips or jam. – dpa