Pepino Melon - How Many Calories?

Pepino is a juicy, mildly sweet fruit with purple streaks on yellow skin. Its edible portion provides 26 calories per 100 g; a weighed 150 g portion gives 39 calories and 10.5 g carbohydrate. Fruit size varies, so weigh what you intend to eat instead of assigning one calorie value to every pepino.

Dietitian's Tips for Consuming Pepino Melon

How to choose a ripe pepino

Look for yellow to golden-yellow skin without bruises or decayed patches. The flesh softens as it ripens; purple stripes alone do not establish ripeness. UC Davis recommends harvesting the fruit ripe and yellow for the best flavour. Do not assume a very green fruit will develop the same sweetness simply by waiting at home.

Can you eat it raw, including the skin?

Ripe pepino can be eaten raw. Wash the outside, halve it, then scoop out the flesh or peel and slice it. The skin and small seeds are edible, though you may prefer to remove the skin if it tastes bitter. Weigh the remaining fruit after peeling or removing the seeded centre.

The mild sweetness can have cucumber-like notes. Serve slices on their own or add them to a fruit salad; honey is optional rather than necessary. When mixing pepino with yogurt, weighing the fruit separately makes the portion easier to track. A 200 g edible portion provides 52 calories.

Combining 150 g plain whole-milk yogurt with 150 g pepino makes a bowl with about 131 calories and 5.66 g protein. Taste the mild fruit mixture before adding anything else; include honey or nuts separately if you use them.

What nutrients does it contribute?

The Peruvian food table reports 29.7 mg vitamin C and 0.3 g protein per 100 g. A 150 g portion supplies about 44.55 mg vitamin C, but little protein. Vitamin C can vary with cultivar and ripeness. Its presence does not establish a disease treatment or fat-burning effect.

Daily vitamin C reference amounts vary by age and life stage; the approximately 44.6 mg from 150 g pepino contributes alongside other fruit and vegetables eaten that day.

Source note

Calculations use the C61 pepino dulce entry in Peru’s INS 2023 table. Missing values, including fibre and potassium, are not treated as zero. Ripeness guidance comes from UC Davis; edible skin and raw preparation are described by produce supplier John Vena.