The date fruit is the product of a date palm, a tree native to Northern Africa and the Middle East, although it is also cultivated in other parts of the world. The dates grow in clusters below the fronds on the palm tree. A single cluster can hold 600 to 1,700 dates on trees as tall as 100 feet or more. The date fruit is one of the oldest tree crops, and has been grown for thousands of years. There is also an Asian variety of dates used to make this product. Ziziphus, commonly called jujube, red date, Chinese date, Korean date, or Indian date, which is a species of Ziziphus in the buckthorn family Rhamnaceae,

Dates are an important traditional crop in the Middle Ease, and north Africa west to Morocco. In Islamic countries, dates and yogurt or milk are a traditional first meal when the sun sets during Ramadan. Dates (especially Medjool and Deglet Noor) are also cultivated in southern California, Arizona and southern Florida in the United States.

The fruit's English name, as well as the Latin species name dactylifera, both come from the Greek word for "finger," dáktulos, because of the fruit's elongated shape. The date fruit is a "drupe" in which an outer fleshy part (exocarp and mesocarp) surrounds a shell (the pit or stone) of hardened endocarp with a seed inside. Dates are oval-cylindrical, 3-7 cm long, and 2-3 cm diameter, and when unripe, range from bright red to bright yellow in color, depending on variety.

Dates provide several essential nutrients such as calcium, fiber, amino acids, sulfur, iron, manganese, magnesium, phosphorous, copper, potassium and fats to the body. They are wonderful sources of dietary fiber and are rich in vitamins A, B1, B2, B3 and B5. They are also low in calories (one date has 23 calories) and are cholesterol free.

Encore Fruit Marketing can provide an excellent source of date juice concentrate to help consumer products deliver one of the 5 A Day fruit servings.

This product is carefully processed from fresh, ripened and dried dates to provide the essential nutrition, flavor and color, in a convenient, ready to use ingredient form for processed beverage and food applications. It is an excellent ingredient to add a fruit serving to your retail label for beverages, cakes, pies, pastries, sauces, and other processed foods like nutrition bars and snacks.

Contact Encore Fruit Marketing today for product samples and information on date juice concentrate at www.encorefruit.com or Click Here to use our convenient Contact Form.