What Acai tastes like

Although the Açai berry looks a lot like blueberries, don't be fooled - they don't taste like blueberries. Want to know what Acai tastes like? Here is what you do...

Get a blender, and the following ingredients:
1 banana
1 mango
1 apple
5 blueberries
3 strawberries
4 raspberries
4 cherries
5 blackberries
3 pineapple wedges
a cup of orange juice
a cup of any other juice
a little lemon or lime
a little honey

Ok, now combine, and blend. Take a drink. Isn't that good? Ok, the smoothie you made tastes NOTHING like Acai, but hey, you did just make a great smoothie!

So what would you expect to experience if you popped one of these little black (or purple) wonders into your mouth and bit down? Well, first of all, you would probably break a tooth. Each Acai berry has a large (in comparison to the rest of the berry) seed in its center, which would be responsible for having one less tooth. The seed itself takes up about 80% of the berry, but the 20% remaining is what gives the Acai berry its magic.

For people that have had the opportunity to eat the Acai berry fresh from the tree, they say it is comparable to boysenberry, or cherries, but with a "chocolate overtone."

Unfortunately for anyone outside the Amazon, it is only available in freeze dried or powder form, or in the more common juice form

What is Açai?

Açai (pronounced ah-sigh-ee) is a fruit, a berry. Well, first its a tree, then its a berry. Ok, first it is a seed, then a tree, then a berry.

In the regions of Brazil, it is called acai, assai, acai-do-baixo, acai-do-para, acaizeiro, piria, jicara, palmiteiro, and Amazonas.
In English, the Açai is also called cabbage palm (but less used now).

The Açai Palm tree looks like many typical palm trees, although you won't find any of these in Palm Beach, CA. It is native to South American, only growing in the Amazon jungle area. It is found mainly along floodplains, swamps, and other saturated and humid areas. Most Acai palm trees grow to 25 feet, very slender, with a full plum of branches.

Most people have had part of this tree before. The inside of the palm is cut out and used as a salad bar delicacy that we know as "heart of palm".

Each Açai palm has shoots of thick bunches of Açai berries. Each branch can hold up to 700-900 of these little Açai berries. It gets pretty crowded on such a small branch, and so the berries are harvested twice a year, usually from July to December, with each stem producing around four to eight bunches.


The seed starts out a green color in its early development stages. As the berries mature, then turn a very dark, rich, color of purple (they get bigger too, but that is kind of a given). The berry itself is about an inch in diameter, roughly the size of a grape, but with the appearance of a blueberry.