What's a red wax jambu? Meet this little-known tropical fruit and the woman who grows it

Since Tropicalia’s launch in 2001, tropical fruit has been a central theme. Beyond the more common varieties like mangos, pineapples and tangerines, we’ve featured rare exotica: cecropia and gac, mombin and caju.

And behind nearly all those stories is the purveyor of such pleasures, (with a dazzling supply of specimens): Fort Myers fruit maven Madeline Bohannon.

Writing about her more than a decade ago, I told readers “She's one of those magical people who showed up early in Tropicalia's history with a seemingly inexhaustible supply of story ideas. That's because she grows a seemingly inexhaustible variety of exotica — most of it fruit, though she's branched out into gourds (the gac), spices (cinnamon trees) and perfumes (ylang-ylang — a key note of Chanel No. 5). Whether it's introducing me (and many readers, I suspect) to the pleasures of grumichamas or revealing the secrets of ripening monsteras, Madeline is always generous with her knowledge about paradise's delicacies. And not only the obscure stuff, but finer points of more common produce.”

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So by now, you’d think she’d have run out of new things to share.

Not to worry. A few months ago, Madeline reached out again, asking if I’d ever tried a red wax jambu.

Red wax jam who? No, as a matter of fact, I hadn’t.

Then could I make it over to get a look, she asked – and a taste?

Any trip to Madeline’s urban fruit farm is a treat, so before long I was pulling in, greeting her cat and getting a post-Ian tour. After a career in airlines (though she's still actively involved in a retiree group and producing its glossy magazine) the Illinois transplant rooted herself on the banks of Billy's Creek in Fort Myers and set about turning her acreage into a garden of earthly delights.

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Though the storm did some heartbreaking damage, she was busy clearing out, salvaging what she could and still harvesting. And one of the varieties that weathered the storm was her red wax jambu, Syzygium samarangense.

This Southeast Asian native comes in several colors, but the red ones are prized for their sweetness and bracing crunch.

Madeline’s were fruiting and flowering at the same time, so I got to see their life cycle, from starry, anemone-looking blossom to green baby jambus (with what almost look like baby faces at one end) to ripe, ready-to-eat fruit.

Red wax jambu aren’t one of the soft, juice-drippy tropicals; they’re crisp, with firm, white flesh.

In their home range, where they’re usually eaten out-of-hand, they’re prized for their cool, refreshing texture.

They’re also known as rose apple, Madeline says, a name that hints at the fruit’s flavor, which is indeed apple-y, with fragrant floral notes. And rest assured the "wax" in its other common name has nothing to do with flavor or texture — it's on account of the fruit's muted, polished-looking gloss.

Relatively fast-growing and hardy (as their ability to withstand Ian demonstrates), for an investment of less than 100 bucks, you can get a shade- and fruit-producing backyard favorites in a matter of years. Part of the fun of edible landscaping is the hunt, but Pine Island's Fruitscapes and ECHO's North Fort Myers nursery would be good bets, though it's wise to call to check availability before heading out. And send up a little thank you to Madeline for her inexhaustible supply of tropical treats.

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