Can anyone ID this fruit?

[taxquestiontime]

This is my neighbours tree but wondering if the fruit is edible?

Loquat?

But don't eat it on the basis of that identification

I'd agree. Google lens image search says loquat too.

Thank you! I have never heard of a loquat but just googled it and that looks right.

I like this description I found online, might have to see if I can pinch a couple. ‘The flavor is a pleasant blend of apricot, plum and cherry with floral overtones, and is quite sweet when ripe. If you like peaches, apricots and plums, you'll love loquats’

Sounds delicious

Looks like a loquat to me. They’re delicious, but have a big seed.

This is our third summer here and I am fairly sure it hasn’t had fruit before - I actually thought the tree was dying as the bark started to come off the main trunk and the branch on the left has died. But I guess it must be ok 🙂

I've always known them as nespoli, FIL has a tree in his garden in Sicily. They have a similar texture to a pear but taste more like an apricot or sweet plum, I love them!

That's interesting - in Portuguese they're nêspera, which I presume is the same root. Nêspera is used for both Medlar (Mespilus) and Japanese Medlar = Loquat.

If the tree is in the UK I’m not sure the fruit will ripen properly here.

I don't know if that's the Sicilian name or if it's actually Italian, but DH has said before that he can understand if people are speaking Portuguese as there's a lot of similarities to Sicilian.

Yes UK, North London! It has been pretty hot here, maybe that is why it had fruit when it doesn’t normally but we tried one and it tasted a bit sharp so maybe it wasn’t ripe

Just leave it to ripen

The ones I've eaten have always been a bit sharp. Maybe there are different varieties

Or maybe they weren’t fully ripe?

Or different tastes? I had someone spit out a fully ripened mulberry because it was “too sharp”, and DH prefers his apricots soft to the verge of mushiness, and complains he never gets any because I’ve always eaten them before they get that ripe.

Entirely possible. I haven't eaten them since I was a child, it's also entirely possible that now I would find them less sharp. I've always liked my fruit a bit sharp, but that's even more the case as I've grown older.

I've always liked my fruit a bit sharp, but that's even more the case as I've grown older. I’ve started to wonder whether the reason I like sharp tastes and bitter tastes is that I haven’t got a good sense of smell, so have to rely on the basic sensations picked up by the tongue - most taste is in fact smell, picked up by the nose as you breath out a mixture of air from lungs and mouth.

That would chime in with your taste veering to the sharp as you get older.

I'm not sure if that's it for me, my nose seems to get more and more sensitive the older I get. But sugar and sweet stuff just don't hold much attraction to me any more, and the less sweet stuff I eat, the less I seem to tolerate it. I'm down to just fruit as the only sugar I eat, and I don't enjoy things like watermelon, figs or nectarines the way I used to. Find them too sweet.

I was feeling jealous until I saw you don’t enjoy figs as much as you did. Interesting your nose is getting sharper - I wonder if there’s hope for me?

And the nectarines! I used to live on nectarines in the summer and figs in the autumn (had a couple of huge fig trees in my last house).

It's also possible that everything around me is just getting smellier....

in March 2020, my sense of smell went strange. It recovered quickly, but since then it seems to be improving. It’s still dreadful, but I keep smelling things I used not to be able to smell

Covid? I know many people who had something that sounds very like it and affected their sense of smell before the pandemic was officially here.

We have these in our garden in Cyprus, we call them Mespila.

That’s really strange. Mespilus is the scientific name for Medlar, not Loquat. I said above that the Portuguese nêspera was used for both Medlar and “Japanese Medlar” = Loquat - is the same true in Cyprus?

I have no idea, that's just what they are called here and we eat them.