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Flavor OF THE YEAR
Anyone holding a fresh fig is imme-diately
faced with a choice: skin, or no
skin? There is no right or wrong answer.
It comes down to personal taste. Fig
skins are edible, but contain an enzyme
called ficin that can cause a tingling
sensation.
Author D.H. Lawrence suggested it
depends on circumstance.
“The proper way to eat a fig, in
society,” he wrote, “is to split it in four,
holding it by the stump, and open it, so
that it is a glittering, rosy, moist, honied,
heavy-petalled flower. Then you throw
away the skin, which is just like a four-sepalled
calyx, after you have taken off
the blossom with your lips. But the vul-gar
way, is just to put your mouth to the
crack, and take out the flesh in one bite.”
However the juicy, fleshy-textured fruit
is eaten, figs are rewarding with their
musky sweetness and hints of vanilla
and honey. The Swiss flavor company
Firmenich has named them the flavor of
the year and describes them as artisanal
and complex. With an array of colors in
their skins from bright green to bronze to
violet, and their delicate strawberry mid-dles,
it’s little wonder they have replaced
the avocado as the most photographed
and trending Instagrammable food.
In Southern kitchens, preserved figs
hold sway over all else. Perhaps because
Southeastern figs are so perishable and
the season so brief, whole Brown Turkey
and Celeste varieties are often dipped
in a syrup with thin slices of lemon and
ginger and drizzled over freshly baked
buttermilk biscuits.
In the Outer Banks, Ocracoke Island
is dotted with 14 varieties that thrive
despite the heat, salt and sand. The
island has become quite famous for
its moist, spice fig cake that was first
made in the 1950s or 1960s by the late
Margaret Garrish. Her children say she
didn’t have dates for a date cake recipe
and her fig version spread to other home
cooks via church suppers and commu-nity
potlucks. The cake is now served
at a number of restaurants on the island
and sold by the slice at a fish house.