Tuesday, February 19, 2008

Pomegranate

The Pomegranate (Punica granatum) is a fruit-bearing deciduous shrub or tiny tree growing to 5–8 m tall. The pomegranate is native to the region from Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Iran to the Himalayas in northern India and has been enlightened and naturalized over the whole Mediterranean region and the Caucasus since antique times. It is widely cultivated throughout Armenia, Azerbaijan, Iran, and India, the drier parts of Southeast Asia, Peninsular Malaysia, the East Indies, and tropical Africa. Introduced into Latin America and California by Spanish settlers in 1769, pomegranate is now cultivated mostly in the drier parts of California and Arizona for its fruits exploited commercially as juice products in advance in popularity since 2001. In the global functional food industry, pomegranate is included among a novel category of exotic plant sources called super fruits.

In the Northern Hemisphere, the fruit is classically in season from September to January. In the Southern hemisphere, it is in period from March to May.

No comments: