It has become naturalized in North America,[3] though, while this is the original base cherry used for it, the maraschino cherry of American commerce is the Royal Ann variety of sweet cherry. The variety was first published by Roberto de Visiani in Flora dalmatica, 1850.[4]
The name marasca comes from the Italian word amarasca, from amaro, which stems from the Latin word amārus (meaning 'bitter').[citation needed]
Compared to other cherries, the fruit of the marasca cherry tree is small, with anthocyanins accounting for its dark, near black colour.[5]
Its bitter taste and drier pulp make marasca cherries ideal for creating fine cherry liqueur.
By definition,[6] true maraschinoliqueur is supposed to be made only from marasca cherries.
↑Noted as feral (verwildert) around Malinska Krk island, in C. Studniczka, Beiträge zur Flora von Süddalmatien 1890:75.
↑Strikić, Frane; Radunić, Mira; Vuletin Selak, Gabriela; Čmelik, Zlatko; Družić, Jasmina, "Comparative Advantages of Sour Cherry 'Marasca' (Prunus cerasus L. var. Marasca) cultivation in Croatia" International conference of "Perspectives in European Fruit Growing", Lednice, Češka Republika, 18-20. October 2006 (on-line abstractArchived 2011-08-12 at the Wayback Machine).
↑Branka Levaj, Verica Dragović-Uzelac, Sandra Pedisić, Dubravka Škevin, "Effect of maturity and geographical region on Aathocyanin content of sour cherries (Prunus cerasus var. marasca), Food Technology & Biotechnology, January 2010 [(on-line abstract ]
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