Stinky Deliciousness: The Durian Soft Serve

Oh, stinky stinky deliciousness... A fruit so smelly it's banned from many airports and other forms of public transportations in Asia, and yet, there's lots of great reasons to eat durian:

(sure it kind of looks like a liver... or half a brain... but it's delicious I promise!)

• it's rich in fiber, so helps with digestion and appetite.
• durian is rich in folate, so can help combat anemia, which women are particularly prone to have
• High in vitamin C, it promotes collagen production, so healthy skin, bones, tendons and ligaments (which is probably a really good idea for me right before I run my 1/2 marathon next week!!!)
• Rich in potassium, it's great for bone health too!
• With high levels of manganese, it also helps regulate blood sugar.
• For thyroid health, durian is a good source of copper, which plays a role in maintaining your metabolism.
• B6, one of the nutrients needed to produce seratonin, a mood enhancer, is quite high in durian... so eating durian might help fight depression!
• Durian has lots of tryptophan, so it also been used to treat anxiety, insomnia, aggression, regulating appetite (by curbing it), PMS, eating disorders, nightmares, and stress!
• Durian also has quite a bit of phosphorus, which promotes healthy teeth and gums, and helps calcium do its job.
• Durian contains very high levels of Organosulfur compounds, which decrease the synthesis of cholesterol, reduce the formation of blood clots, reduce inflammation, are antimicrobial, antibacterial, and antifungal, and also reverses arthritic conditions by helping with joint flexibility, stiffness, and breaking up scar tissue.

I can't say I was ever a huge fan of durian. I remember eating it as a kid and only remember the stink. My mom had a whole bunch of durian candies that my sister and I really didn't like so we tried to give them to Santa Claus along with milk and cookies... not surprisingly, Santa doesn't particularly care for Asian fare, so he didn't eat the durian candies. My dad didn't like durian either... Somehow, I never made the connection...

So why try to eat it again? Well, my BFF has been raving about her durian soft serves for weeks now and made it sound tempting enough that I had to try one. I also knew she would be the only one who could make me fall in love with them (probably because anything she has ever made for me is a Godsend). With the right toppings, durian soft serve is actually amazing. It's has a delicious custard meets banana ice cream kind of consistency. Since it's her secret recipe, I don't want to give away her two secret ingredients, but we topped them with cacao nibs, bananas, mulberries, and raw chocolate cereal crunches... YUM. Seriously, this girl could feed me anything and make me love it.