Feijoas Take Kate Evans Back to Her Childhood

Inspired by her own personal obsession, award-winning journalist and author New Zealander Kate Evans dives into the unique charm of the feijoa. An edited extract from Evans’ book, FEIJOA: a story of obsession and belonging, is published in The Guardian.

“My love affair with feijoas began with the walk home from school on shortening April afternoons, the light as crisp as a granny smith apple. My sisters and I would cast off our school bags and sit under the feijoa tree on our rural gravel driveway, armed with a spoon and a knife – or sometimes just our teeth,” Evans writes.

“Because of the particular way olfactory memories work, the scent of feijoas becomes a lifelong tag for that early experience – capturing the feeling of eating them with family or friends in a familiar neighbourhood or a childhood home.

“When a feijoa’s fragrant esters spark our nostalgia, they become a portal into lost time; an evocative enkindling of childhood, wellbeing and home.”

Original article by Kate Evans, The Guardian, February 23, 2024.

Photo by Lottie Hedley.