African / Vietnamese Eggplant


Vietnamese Eggplant Fruit on Plant

[Gboma (West Africa); Garden Egg (Nigeria); Solanum macrocarpon (cultivated), Solanum dasyphyllum (wild)]

Technically not an eggplant, but very closely related, this nightshade originated in West Africa. It has been introduced into Central and East Africa, the Caribbean, South America and parts of Southeast Asia. There are many cultivars and land races of this species which vary considerably in fruit size. The photo specimen has very long calyx lobes but some have medium or short lobes. Unripe the fruit may be green, white, or purple, but generally ripens to yellow or yellow-brown.They are most commonly harvested unripe and eaten raw or cooked, though they are slightly bitter.   Photo by Vinayaraj distributed under license Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike v3.0 Unported.

In Vietnam they are used in stir fries and soups. They are also eaten raw and pickled.

In West Africa they are used the same as Garden Eggs, including eating the leaves. Leaves are always cooked. The bitter flavor comes from toxic alkaloids, so it is recommended to not over-indulge in this plant, though cooking does reduce the toxins.

More on Eggplants.


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