MICKEY MOUSE FRUIT

When we saw these yellow fruits hanging along the road to Eden Nature Park in Davao City, we were wondering what kind of fruit this is.
These were so attractive especially when displayed in bunches!

 

Do you know what this fruit is?

What is the first thing that enters your mind as you see this fruit?

We initially thought that this was the TIESSA or TISA because of the distinct yellow color, although, 

we wondered about the additional ears...maybe, a variety of tiessa?

So, I googled up the Tiessa and this is what I found out. I chose the data from the Alindanaw blog:
http://alindan0w.blogspot.com/2008/09/interesting-fruit-tiessa.html

Interesting Fruit - Tiessa or Egg Fruit

The Canistel or Egg Fruit  is quite a common fruit in the Philippines where many other fruits of South American origin can also be found, no doubt introduced by the Spanish in the old days. In other Asian countries it is a rather rare curiousity. In the Philippines it's called Tiessa or Tisa or Chessa, another English names is Yellow Sapote as it belongs to the Sapote family or Sapotaceae. 

I realized it looked different, although, the golden yellow color is similar. It must not be a tiessa!

I now couldn't resist but have to find out the name of the golden-yellow fruit so I had to google it again!

I googled "yellow fruit which looks like Mickey Mouse".

Lo and behold, I found it under another blog on ornamental plants with this site: http://wayofdesign.com/blog/?p=8543
The author said that the Nipple Plant or Nipple Fruit is locally called "Mickey Mouse" plant because the fruit resembled the cartoon character.
I also found out it was ornamental and included under the poisonous plant group! 
And to think, we thought it was the edible Tiessa!!!

I am now led to the real name of this plant, Solanum mammosum!
From Wikipedia, this is what I learned about the Nipple Fruit.

Solanum mammosum is commonly known as Nipplefruit, Titty Fruit, Super Duper Titty Fruit , Cow's Udder, or, ambiguously, "Apple of Sodom".^[1] It is an annual to perennial plant in the Solanaceae family, part of the Solanum or nightshade genus, and a relative of the tomato and potato. This poisonous fruit is native to South America, but has beennaturalized in the Greater Antilles, Central America and Caribbean.

In Chinese culture it is known as five fingered eggplant(五指茄). In Japan it is known as Fox Face.

Uses

The plant is grown for ornamental purposes, in part because of the distal end of the fruit's resemblance to a human breast, while the proximal end looks like a cow's udder. It has been used in traditional medicine for the treatment athlete's foot by hunters in Trinidad^[2] and for irritability and restlessness.^{[3][verification needed]} It is sometimes also used as a detergent. It is imported to Taiwan and Hong Kong as decorative foliage for use in religious and festival floral arrangements. They are commonly used in building Chinese New Year trees due to their auspicious golden coloured fruit.

My "problem" is now solved!

I became more interested in it since I saw the live plant at the Eden Nature Park in Davao City!

 

Come to think of it, in retrospect, I know that this was one of the ornamental plants!
I just got misled when we saw the Nipple Fruits hanging as a bunch in small stalls on the way to Davao City and thought that these were edible fruits!
No wonder they were not mixed with the stall with edible fruits.
It was indeed the first time I saw that these were sold as bunches as ornamentals!

I guess, I am still happy I learned something new today!