custard apple
- noun
- /ˈkʌstərd ˈæpəl/
- UK
:
chirimoya
- For dessert, we enjoyed a delicious custard apple topped with honey.
Examples
-
She pointed to a custard apple half on a plate, glistening and milky sweet.
Fiction book (1995) -
On the way, we walked through slushy mud and picked a few custard apples from the tree.
Blog text (26) -
Finally, we reached our car and had some snacks that included a custard apple and coconut water that we bought on the way to the farm.
Blog text (26) -
He had two papaya trees, a guava, a custard apple, and a jackfruit tree.
Fiction book (1995) -
At the market, I bought a fresh custard apple that was ripe and sweet.
-
The smoothie was made with mashed custard apple and a splash of lime juice.
Synonyms
1
9.9
A tropical tree and its large green fruit with sweet creamy flesh
A tropical tree from the Americas that grows sweet, soft fruit
A tropical tree that makes sweet fruit with a thick scaly skin
Sweet fruit with thick scaly skin and creamy flesh with black seeds
A small tropical tree that produces a rough, heart-shaped, sour fruit eaten as a custard apple
How Sweet
Surface Forms
Morphology
custard + apple
The compound is compositionally interpretable: 'custard' (a creamy dessert) + 'apple' signals a kind of fruit with custard-like, sweet, soft flesh, so a learner who knows both words would infer it refers to a fruit (or fruit tree) with that quality. This follows a common noun+noun naming pattern rather than an idiomatic shift, making the meaning accessible to B1 learners.
Etymology
Custard apple may get its name from the fruit's soft, creamy flesh that looks and tastes like custard. So people named this sweet tropical fruit a custard apple to show its custard-like texture.