Persimmon trees are a lovely ornamental specimen fruit tree, often with a semi weeping form, which gives a beautiful display of deep orange autumn leaves, and retains many of its orange coloured fruit after leaf fall, making it the prettiest fruit tree in the winter garden. The botanical word for persimmon trees is ‘diospyros’ meaning ‘food of the gods’, and it’s not far wrong either – the problem with these fruit being that they are often not left to ripen properly before eating, and they are very astringent when unripe. When ripe they are a delicious rich sweet flavour quite unlike any other fruit in the garden. Louis Glowinski suggests flavour is not unlike apricot jam.