Fruits
Lychee
A
lychee is a rare sub tropical fruit originating in South
China where the lychee is very important in their
culture and is famed as "the King of Fruits".
The lychee fruit is about 1 to 1 1/2 inches in size, oval
to rounded heart shaped and the bumpy skin is red in
color. Once you peel the skin off, the crisp juicy flesh
of a lychee fruit is white or pinkish, translucent and
glossy like the consistency of a grape, but the taste is
sweeter.
Lychees have a sub acid sweet taste and have a
wonderful freshness to them that is hard to describe.
Lychee fruit is high in the antioxidant Vitamin C and
the essential mineral Potassium.
Lychee trees are beautiful hardwoods that grow 20 to 40
feet tall in a primarily dome shaped habit of growth
with dense, evergreen leaves. Lychee trees are popular
landscape trees in South Florida and other areas of the
southern U.S. and container, atrium or greenhouse
growing of lychee trees is becoming popular throughout
the rest of the country.
Lychee trees are grown commercially in the US for the
highly sought after fruit in primarily South and Coastal
Central Florida where it is warm and their is some
winter chilling, but little or no risk of hard freezes.
