Sapote

Sapote (from Nahuatl tzapotl)^[1] is a term for a soft, edible fruit. The word is incorporated into the common names of several unrelated fruit-bearing plants native to Mexico, Central America and northern parts of South America.

Some but not all sapotes come from the family Sapotaceae:

• Sapotaceae sapotes:
  • Sapodilla (Manilkara zapota) is native to Mexico, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Belize, and possibly El Salvador. The Sapotaceae were named after this species.
  • Yellow sapote (Pouteria campechiana) is native to Mexico and Central America.
  • Mamey sapote (Pouteria sapota) is from southern Mexico to northern South America.
  • Green sapote (Pouteria viridis) is native to lowland southern Mexico.

• Ebenaceae sapotes:
  • Black sapote (Diospyros digyna), from eastern Mexico south to Colombia, is probably the original Aztec tzapotl.
  • Chapote (Diospyros texana) is native to the lower Rio Grande valley region in Texas and Mexico

• Other sapotes
  • White sapote (Casimiroa edulis: Rutaceae) is native to northern and central Mexico, Costa Rica, El Salvador and Guatemala.^[2]
  • South American sapote (Quararibea cordata: Malvaceae) is native to the Amazon rainforests of Brazil, Colombia, Ecuador, and Peru.

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  Black sapote

• 

  White sapote

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  South American sapote

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  Lòng mứt, a kind of Vietnamese sapote

• 

  Mamey sapote

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  Sapodilla

• 

  Yellow sapote

References

1. ^ Watson, George (April 1938). "Nahuatl Words in American English". American Speech 13 (2): 113–114. JSTOR 451954. 
2. ^ "Casimiroa edulis". Germplasm Resources Information Network. United States Department of Agriculture. http://www.ars-grin.gov/cgi-bin/npgs/html/taxon.pl?9292. Retrieved 2009-03-26.