Canistel (pouteria campechiana) is the name of a rather small tree, that is widely spread in South America and Southeast Asia due to its showy flowers and delicious fruits. The shape and size of the fruits lead to the common name chicken egg or eggfruit tree. The fruits are round to spindle-shaped and have egg yolk yellow, tasty and aromatic pulp, that is why the tree has been spread far beyond its native growing region in Mexico, Central America and the Caribbean and has become a widespread fruit tree, particularly in Southeast Asia. The close relationship of Canistels with ericaceous plants (Ericales) can be nicely seen in the burls of this tree: the wood is extremely fine grained, very dense and hard, only the color is lighter than the more reddish famous Bruyere. Since the burls unfortunately do not grow very large, there are no greater diameters than ca. 20 - 30 cm, but the extremely fine-grained wood is a real rarity!
