Mamoncillo Daiquiris

New York has a special relationship with its fruit vendors. Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night stays these guys; all year round they're there, in summers with sunglasses, on rainy spring days with tarps, in winter bundled into parkas. They're like our street corner vending machines, dispensing fruit and nuts with precision and a regularity to rival the Postal Service. Just be warned: When avocados are three for a dollar, it really is too good to be true.

Mamoncillo fruit, in their natural state.

They also have a really superb selection. When my corner market is out of fresh figs, my corner fruit guy never is. And in summer, they're loaded down with mamoncillo, a fruit that hardly ever shows up stores. I've passed several vendors both in Manhattan and Brooklyn that have the little green buds right now, and of course, I couldn't resist them.

Uncracked.

Mamoncillo is most often called quenapa in New York, as it is in Puerto Rico. Of course, it also goes by a hundred other names—mamón, ackee, chenet, guaya, gnep, guinep, skinnip, genip, guinep, ginnip, kenèp, talpa jocote, canepa, genepa, xenepa, kenepa, limoncillo, and Spanish lime, which refers to its flavor, as it is a drupe (see: peach) rather than a citrus.

Cracked!

To eat a mamoncillo fruit, you crack the shell with your teeth, and then suck on its pit, which is covered with a thin layer of soft fruit. It's a bit like a pomegranate in this regard, and is often eaten with salt and chili, like a mango (warning: the juice stains terribly, and was used by Native Americans to dye cloth.) The pit itself can be roasted and eaten, but I decided to cook the fruits whole, which I gather is a bit sacrilegious. Eaten raw, the taste is lime-esque; after simmering the fruit with sugar, its flavor regressed to something between a peach and a guava. Perfect, I thought, for a cocktail.

Mamoncillo Simple Syrup

• 1/2 lb mamoncillo fruit, shelled
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup water

Simmer all the ingredients together for 6-8 minutes. Cool the mixture and refrigerate for 24 hours before using. Strain, if desired.

Ready for Papa.

Mamoncillo Daiquiri

• 1.5 oz rum (I used Smith + Cross, here's why)
• 1 oz mamoncillo syrup
• juice of 1/2 lime

Shake the rum, syrup, and lime juice with ice, strain, and serve in a chilled glass.

Disclaimer: Glass not approved by American Bar Association.