What Actually Qualifies As A Stone Fruit?

Stone fruits: They're the peaches that drip all over your bare legs at the beach and the cherries that stain the tips of your fingers red. They're oh-so-juicy, incredibly sweet, and they make a delicious filling for a pie or a crumble. From apricots to nectarines and everything in between, this sunset-colored category of fruits is a true summertime delight. But what, exactly, qualifies as a stone fruit? Simply put, a stone fruit is any fruit that has a single hard pit in the center — but it's a little more complicated than that.

Stone fruits are at their peak throughout the summertime. Their season typically begins in early spring and ends in early fall. Scientifically speaking, stone fruits are called drupes; they're just commonly referred to as stone fruits because of the pit, or "stone," that sits in their center, which is technically a large seed. The most well-known stone fruits fall under this category: Think cherries, peaches, olives, and plums. Coconuts, dates, and mangoes are also technically stone fruits, too.

You can also classify a stone fruit as either clingstone or freestone. This refers to how easily you can pull the flesh away from the pit, and it's most often used when categorizing peaches. It's easy to remove the pit from a freestone peach, making it ideal for snacking, baking, and canning. Clingstone peaches, on the other hand, are ideal for eating only, since their pit is difficult to remove for baking or cooking projects. 

When it comes to identifying stone fruits, peaches, plums, and cherries are no-brainers because they have an obvious pit, which is encapsulated by their flesh and skin. However, there are a few fruits you probably didn't realize were stone fruits, both due to their names and their actual makeup. That's right: You probably refer to blackberries, raspberries, and mulberries as types of berries, but they're actually stone fruits. It seems strange, since you can eat the entirety of a raspberry or blackberry. There's no pit in their centers that you have to eat around and discard like a typical stone fruit. 

But have you ever eaten a raspberry and wondered what those little crunchy bits that get stuck in your teeth are? Well, those are actually tiny pits that make these so-called "berries" stone fruits. These stone fruits are referred to as aggregates of drupelets, which means that they are made up of a cluster of individual small stone fruits, each with their own corresponding pits. So, the next time you're enjoying a slice of raspberry pie, you can appreciate the fact that you're eating a bunch of tiny stone fruits, all mashed up into one delicious, tart fruit.