“Feijoa- A Story of Obsession & Belonging” Interview with Author Kate Evans

This week, we were lucky enough to collaborate with author Kate Evans, of “Feijoa- A Story of Obsession & Belonging”, Kate is a freelance journalist from Raglan, New Zealand, and spins an engaging tale, taking us through the lush landscape of her childhood home with a story “about the dance between people and plants, how we need each other, how we change each other, and the surprising ways certain species worm their way into our imaginations, our stomachs, and our hearts.” She shares, “plants and humans have a long, deep, powerful relationship, and it was an honor to tell the story of just one of them.”

To the amusement of our Horticulturist Sam Hubert, Kate quotes a 1912 newspaper article that declared “he who drinks beer, thinks beer. But he who eats pineapple guava thinks in pineapple, raspberry and banana, all at once”, truly a nod to the complexity of this magical plant. Pineapple guava have hypnotic, tropical looking white flowers with cupped, soft petals and crimson centers that frame showy , red stamin. Enjoy our interview with Kate, and be sure to add her book Feijoa- A Story of Obsession & Belonging to your must read list. Cheers!

OGW: Hi Kate! Thanks for taking the time to speak with us. Firstly, we’d love to know, how did your experiences with pineapple guavas influence the writing of your memoir?

Kate: When I was a child in rural New Zealand, my sisters and I would come home from school on the bus, walk up the driveway, chuck off our school bags and eat pineapple guavas by the dozen. I packed them in my school lunchboxes and with my Dad experimented making ice cream and muffins with them. When I moved overseas at age 18, if I managed to find a Feijoa, the smell would immediately trigger a kind of sensory flashback to my New Zealand home. But it was only when I moved back there, aged 30, that I started wondering why this South American fruit had such a powerful nostalgic hold on me. 

OGW: Can you share some of the challenges and rewards you encountered while cultivating pineapple guavas? How did these experiences shape your understanding of the fruit’s symbolic significance?

Kate: I moved around so much as a young adult, so it’s only in the last few years that I’ve been able to plant my own Feijoas – or rather, pineapple guavas I share with my family and my sister’s family, on the land we bought together. Planting them felt like a way of literally putting down roots in this new soil, of committing to living in one place and becoming a ‘somewhere person’ after many years as an ‘anywhere person.’

OGW: Can you share any favorite facts or anecdotes about feijoas that you discovered during your writing process?

Kate: I learned so many surprising things! Here are some: 

* The feijoa evolved 23 million years ago among monkeys, giant ground sloths and ‘terror birds’ in South America—but it is distantly related to New Zealand’s pōhutukawa and Australia’s eucalyptus. 

* The word ‘feijoa’ can ultimately be traced back to the 17th Century Spanish monk and philosopher Benito Jerónimo Feijóo, a feminist and myth-buster centuries before his time. 

* The oldest feijoa tree I found was located not in New Zealand or its South American homeland, but in the Hanbury Gardens in Italy: it is at least 110 years old. 

* In tropical Colombia, high in the Andes, the lack of defined seasons so confuses the feijoa that it flowers and fruits all year round—meaning you can garnish your fresh fruit smoothie with a blossom from the tree. 

* Feijoas have been in California longer than they’ve been in New Zealand, are widely planted, and were once predicted to be the ‘fruit of the century’ there. 100 years later, the fruits sometimes rot on the ground as many people aren’t even aware they’re edible. 

* The largest and most delicious feijoas I found anywhere in the world were grown by a solitary Tākaka breeder on a divine mission to create the perfect feijoa. 

* Feijoas aren’t a “super fruit” — they’re healthy and delicious, but don’t contain outrageous amounts of vitamins or iodine. They may, however, help reduce inflammation, and one study is currently investigating whether they can tame blood glucose levels in diabetics—something traditional Afro-Brazilian communities in the feijoa’s heartland already know. 

OGW: Can you describe any unique insights or lessons you learned from growing pineapple guavas that you incorporated into your narrative?

Kate: Ha I’m certainly no gardening expert! But… pruning stimulates flowering, and space in the tree allows pollinators – mostly birds – to reach them. (It’s the sweet petals they’re after – you can eat them too.) So give them a good prune in winter. Also make sure you get more than one so they can cross pollinate. 

OGW: What surprised you most about the process of writing this book?

Kate: The fact that I actually pulled it off! There were many times over the decade it took to write it that I doubted it would ever happen. Luckily my partner and a few other friends believed in me, and I’m really stubborn once I start something, and in the end I found a dream publisher in NZ’s Moa Press. 

OGW: Do you have a favorite feijoa cultivar of all the many you’ve tasted?

Kate: Nigel Ritson’s many incredible selections in Takaka that unfortunate don’t tend to be commercially available. 

OGW: Favorite recipe or new use for feijoas you discovered while writing this book?

Kate: Feijoa fizz – chuck the skins in a jar with water and sugar, push the skins under the surface with a glass, leave for 3 days – delicious. 

Also Colombian style smoothies with Feijoas, milk and sugar, put in a little bit of skin for color. Yum! 

OGW: What do you hope readers take away from “Feijoa,” and what message or feeling do you most want to convey through your work?

Kate: I suppose it’s the idea that the smallest objects can be bristling with surprising stories. That becoming curious about a specific thing can lead to unexpected journeys, insights and lessons. One of the things that surprised me was how delving into the pineapple guava’s story made me reflect on what it means to connect deeply to landscape and nature in a colonized country as a non-indigenous person. I don’t think I found the answers necessarily, but wrestling with the question through the lens of this beloved plant was rich, sometimes awkward, but meaningful territory for me. 

Plants and humans have a long, deep, powerful relationship, and it was an honor to tell the story of just one of them.

Thank you Kate! And if you still can’t get enough of the Pineapple Guava, we’ll have an upcoming blog post featuring Feijoa, which will include a simple Feijoa curd recipe!