The rose apple from Kalapa city

In "the coconut story part II" (Link here), I mentioned about Kalapa city (currently Jakarta) that was famous from high-quality rose apple. So I would like to mention about this Kalapa rose apple and the rose apple species in Thailand.

The rose apple (called in Thai as “Chom-poo”) is a plant in genus Syzygium, which is a member of Myrtaceae family. There is a hypothesis that these Syzygium plants were firstly discovered in India continent before spreading to South-Easther Asia. The name Chom-poo in Thai is believed that was derived from the Java word “Jambu air” meaning rose apple. However, some say that this Java word also derived from the Indian words, due to the origin of the rose apple. In Marathi, rose apple is called “Jamb” and in Tamil is called “Champai”, both of them are sound resemble to Jambu word in Java.

At this present in Thailand, there are nine official “Chom-poo” species as follow:

Syzygium aksornae (in Thai “Chom-poo-ak-sorn”)

Syzygium anacardiifolium (in Thai “Chom-poo-krom”)

Syzygium aqueum or water rose apple

Syzygium formosum (in Thai “Chom-poo-nok)

Syzygium jambos or the rose apple

Syzygium malaccense or Malay apple

Syzygium pseudoformosum (in Thai “Chom-poo-nok-pak-tai”)

Syzygium samarangense or wax apple, Java apple

Syzygium siamense (in Thai “Chom-poo-nam”)

Noted that the rose apple is called in Hindi as “Gulab Jamun”, which is also the name of the Indian sweet. From the rounded-shape, color and flower-like fragrance of the sweet which is resemble to the fruit of rose apple, This sweet might originally made to mimic the rose apple fruit.

Flower of Malay apple, Bangna, Bangkok

In botanical fact, the current commercial rose apple species in Thailand are mainly developed from the Syzygium aqueum. For the Wasterner, the representations of “Chom-poo” species are mainly developed from the Syzygium samarangense species.

Since Syzygium samarangense has the habitat in Java (now Indonesia), the Kalapa rose apple is indeed this species.

At last, I’d like to talk more about one of my favorite fruit, Chpm-poo-phet.

Chomm-poo-phet is believed that is the mixed breed between Malay apple and Java apple. The first cultivated of this breeding is in the Era of King Rama IV. There is a record that King Rama IV gave the grafted branch of Chom-poo that growth in his place to a monk and he came to cultivated it at Phetchaburi province. Since the first cultivated place is at Phetchaburi province, this plant was given name Chom-poo-phet. Nowadays, Chom-poo-phet is one of the important economic plant in this province.