Fruta-do-conde, also known in Brazil as “pinha,” is one of several fruits of the “annona” family (aka “annonaceae”) popular in Brazil. As I understand, fruta-do-conde is called “sugar-apple” in English and is “annona squamosa” in Latin. Two other common fruits from this family are “cherimoya” (which I once saw in Safeway in CA) and “atemoya.” Fruta-de-conde is originally from the Carribean, cherimoya is from the Andes, and atemoya is a man-made hybrid of the two. All three taste like some kind of hybrid of a banana and a pear. I think atemoya tastes best, though it takes a bit of practice to tell them apart either by taste or visually. (They are probably about as different as oranges and tangerines.) There is more information about this fruit and it’s releatives at Trade Winds Fruit.

A few words on the term sugar-apple. It always amuzes me to see “English” words for things that are unknown to most English speakers. When I was in Finland, I was told several times that a popular local berry is called “cloudberry” in English. Now, there is something strange about an “English” word that is know to more Finns than Americans. At the same time, this supports Hilary Putnam theory about “division of linguistic labor” that argues that the meaning of word is not merely what arbitrary native speakers of the language think it is, but rather responsibility for meaning of many words is assigned to experts. This explains how it is possible that things unknown to all but very few English speakers have “English” names. (This all probably sounds obvious to those who haven’t done philosophy of language.)