Persimmon butter with blood orange and maple syrup

Last Updated on January 6, 2023 by Aaron von Frank

Find out how to make Asian persimmon butter flavored with blood oranges and sweetened with a small amount of maple syrup! 

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What ingredients do you need to make this persimmon butter recipe?

Here are all the ingredients you’ll need to make this simple persimmon butter recipe, with more details and alternative ingredients provided further below: 

• squishy ripe Asian persimmons
• fresh-squeezed orange juice and zest, preferably from organic blood oranges
• pure maple syrup
• ginger powder
• cinnamon powder
• clove powder
• salt

Use squishy ripe Asian persimmons – or use this quick hack to make your persimmons quickly get squishy ripe…

Let’s dive right into the most important factor needed to get this recipe right: use VERY ripe Asian persimmons (aka Japanese persimmons).

We use ‘Ichi Ki Kei Jiro’ persimmons, but you can use any type of Asian persimmon so long as they’re squishy to the touch. 

You can scale the size of this recipe up or down based on how many persimmons you want to use, but the base recipe calls for the pureed pulp of 32 persimmons (skins removed first), which produces a starting point of about 13 cups of persimmon pulp. We let all the ingredients cook down by about 40% of their original volume to yield 8 cups of finished persimmon butter.  

What if you have ripe but still firm Asian persimmons? Stick them in the freezer for 24 hours, then let them thaw after which they’ll be squishy ripe and ready to turn into persimmon butter. 

Processing soft Asian persimmons for this recipe

Using the persimmon skins will create a mealy texture in your persimmon butter. Thus, we recommend cutting each persimmon in half and scooping/scraping out the pulp with a spoon.

Also, even seedless persimmons will occasionally produce seeds so be sure to remove any seeds as you go. (We found 7 seeds in our batch.) By cutting through the middle of the fruit, you’ll be able to reveal the area where any seeds would be present.

Another thing to be on the lookout for: every so often, a persimmon that looks good on the outside will be rotten in the middle. You definitely don’t want to add a bad persimmon to your ingredients! 

Blood oranges – or alternatives

We use the juice and zest of two Moro blood oranges for this recipe because we have ripe fruit on our potted tree right now. Don’t have blood oranges? Just use regular oranges, and you’ll be fine. 

Orange juice bumps up the acidity and adds a bit of tang to the recipe. 

As for the orange zest, we’d recommend not using it unless you have organically grown oranges, since there’s likely to be a fairly high amount of synthetic pesticide residue in/on the skin tissue that can’t be fully washed off of conventionally grown oranges. Yes, organic farmers can and do use pesticides too, they just don’t use synthetic pesticides. 

Maple syrup

Since Asian persimmons are naturally sweet, this recipe only uses a small amount of maple syrup (1/2 cup) to add a bit more sweet plus some nuanced flavor notes.

You can also use alternative liquid sweeteners like honey or agave syrup 1:1 as substitutions for maple syrup. You could also use brown sugar if you’d prefer to add some molasses notes.

A crockpot or other slow cooker helps!

We use a 7 quart Crockpot to make this recipe because it makes things very easy:

• Put all ingredients in the Crockpot. Turn to high (with cover on) until ingredients reach boil, then turn down to low. 
• Remove cover, and let the ingredients cook down for 12-18 hours (we considered ours done at 18 hours), stirring occasionally to make sure the ingredients aren’t sticking or burning. 
• Transfer to sterilized jars for short or long-term storage depending on what canning tools you have available (see below). 

Don’t have a Crockpot? Just a use a stainless steel or ceramic pot on your stovetop and plan to keep a closer eye on things, e.g. don’t leave it on overnight. It will likely cook much faster on your stovetop than in a Crockpot. 

Pressure cooker or fridge storage

This persimmon butter is indeed delicious, but it’s not worth dying for. There’s a risk of botulism (which can be fatal) in improperly canned foods or in foods that don’t have high acidity. If you have a pressure canner, worry-free canning is yours to be had.

If you don’t have a pressure canner, we’d recommend storing your finished jars of persimmon butter in your fridge until you’re ready to use them. They should last at least a month in your fridge stored in sterilized jars. 

How to eat

How do you eat persimmon butter? Put a generous scoop on breakfast pancakes or waffles, yogurt, or dairy desserts. Or slather it in on a piece of fresh homemade bread.

Basically, eat persimmon butter the same way you’d eat apple butter.  

Recipe: Persimmon butter with blood oranges and maple syrup

Now let’s get cooking!

Enjoy! 

KIGI,

• American vs Asian persimmons – growing, foraging, eating
• How to make hoshigaki, traditional slow-dried & massaged Asian persimmons
• How to store Asian persimmons – with recipes!
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