Definition of "pawpaw"

pawpaw¹

/ˈpɔːpɔː/

noun
plural pawpaws
1. Any of several types of trees having edible fruit:
  1. Asimina, a genus of trees and shrubs native to eastern North America, especially common pawpaw (Asimina triloba)
  2. Papaya (Carica papaya), a widely cultivated tropical fruit tree
  3. Mountain pawpaw (Vasconcellea pubescens), a fruit tree native to South America
2. The fruit of these trees.
  Quotations
  Throughout the years it's gone by a lot of names—frost banana, Indiana banana, fetid-bush, bandango, custard apple, prairie banana, poor man's banana—but most of the time it's just been called pawpaw. At first glance, both the fruit and the tree seem out of place in North America.]
  [2015, Andrew Moore, Pawpaw: In Search of America’s Forgotten Fruit, Chelsea Green Publishing, page 1
  Xavier sliced the pawpaw in half, emptying the tiny black seeds over the veranda wall.
  2021, Leone Ross, This One Sky Day, Faber & Faber Limited, page 254
  If there were such a thing as an anticapitalist fruit, the pawpaw, commonly foraged in the wild and inherently resistant to commodification, might qualify.
  2023 September 29, Molly Fitzpatrick, “He’s the Pawpaw King of Brooklyn. (What’s a Pawpaw?)”, in The New York Times‎

pawpaw²

/ˈpɔːpɔː/

noun
plural pawpaws
1. (dialectal or colloquial) Grandfather.