Passion Vine Oddity

I found what I think is an oddity growing with my plants this morning. I found a miniature passion vine with mini flowers and mini fruit growing on it. I've never seen one like it and after searching the web I can't find another! For those who don't live in these warm climes, a passion vine can grow very big. They grow up giant oak trees and spread over long distances. Some have fruit and some are only desirable for the pretty flowers. All the flowers are pretty much the same, just different colors. The vines that produce edible fruit have white and purple blooms. The flowers are very pretty and are suppose to symbolize the crucifixion. The passion flower's petals relate to the Apostles, the cornea to the crown of thorns, the five anthers to the five wounds and the three stigmas to the three nails.

The passion fruit is a round ball usually about tennis ball size. They fall off the vine when they are ripe. The juice and seeds are encased in a hard pithy shell. You can eat the goo inside and it is very tasty. To get the juice, I have found that the easiest way is to split the ball, scoop out the goo and put it in a blender. After pulsing the blender for a while, the goo, juice, and seeds separate. If you put is all through a sieve the seeds stay behind and you are left with a mix of goo and juice. You can use this in place of any other kind of juice. I add it to fresh squeezed orange juice and it "brightens" up the flavor of the oranges. Hmmmm yummy.

Photo 1 is a regular size passion fruit. They start out green and as they ripen they turn brown and eventually shrivel up and fall off the vine when ripe. Good planning by Mother Nature because they are so high in the tree I couldn't get them. The shell is very hard and there is no damage when they fall from the trees. Photo 2 is a regular passion flower. Photo 3 is the mini flower. Photo 4 is the miniature passion vine with fruit and flowers. Photo 5 is the mini fruit. Photo 6 is the mini flower with a quarter and Photo 7 is the mini fruit with a quarter.

I am curious to see how much juice I get from each of the little passion fruits. Hope I can find them after they fall off the vine!